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ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 



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Abraham Lincoln 



ASSASSINATED 



At Washington, Ajyril 14, 1865: 



BEING A BKIEF ACCOUNT OF THE 

PROCEEDINGS OF MEETINGS, ACTION OF AVTHOEITIES AND SOCIETIES, 

SPEECHES, SERMONS, ADDRESSES AND OTHER EXPRESSIONS OF 

PUBLIC FEELING ON RECEPTION OF THE NEWS, AND AT 

THE FUNERAL OBSEQUIES OF THE PRESIDENT, 



AT BUFFALO, N. Y 



/ 



BUFFALO: 
PRINTI2fG HOUSE OF MATTHEWS &. WAREEN, 

Office of the Buffalo Commercial Advertiser. 

1865. 






t-4S"| 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN, 

Assasdnated Good Friday, 18G5. 

^'Forgive them, for they know not lohat they do!" 

He said, and so went shriven to his fate — 
Unknowing went, that generous heart and true. 

Even while he spake the slayer lay in wait, 

And when the morning opened Heaven's gate 
There jjassed the whitest soul a nation knew. 

Henceforth all thoughts of pardon are too late ; 
They, in whose cause that arm its weapon drew, 

Have murdered Mercv. Now alone shall stand 
Blind Justice, with the sword unsheathed she wore. 

Hark, from the eastern to the western strand 
The swelling thunder of the people's roar : 

What words they murmur — Fetter xot her haxd ! 

So I-ET IT SMITE, SUCH DEEDS SHALL BE NO MORE ! 

— Edmund 0. Stedman. 



fit gcttt0i'iirm. 



Saturday, April 15tli, 1865, was a clay of mourning in 
Buffalo. The direful news of tlie assassination of the 
President, and the attempted murder of Secretary Seward, 
passed from mouth to mouth, until within a space of time 
almost incredibly short, it was diffused over the entire 
city. Workmen on their early way to the forges and 
shoj)S spoke of the awfiil calamity with blanched faces ; 
friends met and shook hands in silence or conversed with 
quivering lips and choked utterance ; bells tolled ; the 
usual sounds peculiar to a busy city on the busiest day 
of the week were hushed, and it seemed that a pall had 
been spread over all. 

With one accord, as it ^vere, the stores were closed, all 
traffic was suspended, and the sable emblems of woe ap- 
peared on every hand. From the dwelling of the hum- 
blest colored family to the mansion of the most opulent 
citizen, fluttered the half-mast flag, and there were few 



localities were some manifestations of sorrow were not ap- 
parent. All business was suspended. Tlie streets were 
crowded, and tlie telegraj)li offices were besieged by those 
eager to obtain the latest tidings ; men stood in knots 
and conversed upon tlie sad event, and told their hopes 
and fears for the future; and the usual avocations and 
pastimes w^ere forgotten in the contemplation of the over- 
whelming calamity. 

On receiving the despatch which announced that the 
President had breathed his last, a large placard, of which 
the following is a copy, was printed at the office of the 
Commercial Advertiser^ and distributed gratuitously : 



THE PRESIDENT IS DEAD! 

WAE DEPARTMENT, 

Washington, April 15, 1865. 

To MAJ. GENEKAL DIX, 

Abraham Lincoln died this morning at twenty- 
two minutes after Seven o'clock. 

E. M. STANTON, Sec. of War. 



These were placed in the windows of very many hoases 
and stores. 

The citizens, the Board of Trade, the Masonic order, 
the Churches, all took proper action on the occasion. 

The followino; was the leadino; editorial in the Com- 
mercial Advertiser, on the afternoon of Saturday : 



9 

TTTE stand in tlio presence of a sudden and terrilble national ca- 

* * lamity. Like thunder from a clear sky, the intelligence of 
the assassination of the President of the United States has fallen 
uj^on the unprepared ears, and has sunk deep into the hearts of the 
people. From the summit of our great joy over the near presence 
of peace through victory, ^xe have been suddenly cast down into 
mourning. For the third time within less than a quarter of a cen- 
titry, death has smitten the representative head of the nation; but 
this time he has come in a shape which will create a sensation all 
over Christendom, infinitely more profound than attended the death 
of Plarrison or Taylor. 

The shock of the terrible event is still so fresh upon all, and the 
results so full of apprehension and conjecture, that we stand appalled. 
It has come upon us at a time so ripe with the consummations of a 
great struggle, and so deeply freighted with the destinies of our na- 
tion, that words are but vanity, and thoughts are too tumultuous for 
deliberate expression. It comes "in the days wlien the keepers of 
the house shall tremble, and the strong men bow themselves." 
Truly, " the mourners go about the streets." "VVe mourn the loss 
of one who w^as a stalwart reaper in the harvest field of the world's 
progress; one who had "borne his faculties so meek, and had been 
so clear in his great ofiice, that his virtues will plead like angels, 
trumpet-tongued, against the deep damnation of his taking off." 
Although his mortal remains now lie inanimate in the White House, 
yet Abraham Lincoln is not dead ! He still lives, and will live " to 
the last syllable of recorded time " in the mighty accomplishments 
which he achieved, as God's chosen instrument. His death -sy^as his 
apotheosis. He has been promoted to the sublime rank of The 
American Martyr. He has but gone forward to take command of 
the silent soldiers of the Republic, whose invisible hands shall here- 
after reach out from the Eternal, and sustain and protect our gov- 
ernment. 

We mourn for him as a man, as a fither, as a husband ; we mourn 
for him as the political architect, who was called to the second build- 
ing of our temple, the completed glories of which it was forbidden 
that he should witness. We mourn for the unacliieved possibilities 
of his fame; but we mourn not without hope. Wherefore ? 

Because every drop of Abraham Lincoln's blood has been sancti- 
fied to tlie perfect work of our regeneration ; and will be the talis- 



10 

man of an inexorable purpose all tliroiigli the land. Every Ameri- 
can heart that beats worthily and honestly, to-day beats higher and 
foster, with a steadfast purpose of perseverance, and a more unyield- 
ing endeavor. We accept, as a sacred inheritance, the precious 
legacy of his unfinished labors : and, by God's grace, we will com- 
plete them. 

To the dead, we say: "Hail! and farewell ! " Reverently lifting 
up his fallen mantle, we pray for the Divine guidance to him who 
has fallen heir to it. 

Abraham Lincoln died upon the eve of the anniversary of the Cru- 
cifixion. His soul took its flight amid the echoes of solemn praises 
wl^ch accompanied the raising of the old flag over Sumter. Both 
are significant. The nation has completed its atonement; let the 
New Man and the People see to it that the New Dispensation shall 
come. 

The Courier, in its first issue after tlie death of Mr. 
Lincoln, spoke as follows: 

/^VER the bier of the murdered President, his political friends 
^-^ and political enemies clasp hands, in common execration of the 
crime, and common grief over the national calamity, of his assas- 
sination. The event is utterly without parallel in our own history, 
and we doubt whether the annals of a thousand years furnish a 
precedent for a deed so monstrous and fraught with so momentous 
consequences. The heart of the country was the mark of the assas- 
sin; civilization, not in this hemisphere only, but everywhere, felt 
the shock of the murderous blow. 

Words are vain to comment adequately on the tragedy itself ; we 
can only follow imperfectly, in expression, some of the thoughts it 
suggests. Abraham Lincoln, on the flital night of his murder, held 
relations to the country and to the world, the importance of which 
it is impossible to calculate. Compelled during a part of his ad- 
ministration to oj^pose his 2)olicy, we yet realize that not only was 
he at this time peculiarly the embodiment of the " American idea," 
but in him and his action, as developed during the later days of his 
life, was centered the hope of the people. The germ of pacification 
— of a return on the part of a distraught and divided country, to 
unity, peace and prosperity — lay in the brain which was pierced 



11 

with a mortal Avound ou Friday night. If they mourn him who 
have gloried in him as their leader in war, much more should they 
grieve, who, in the midst of Avar, have been most Avearily sighing 
for peace. 

Tliere was a time after the fearful news came, Avhen it seemed 
that the hand of sacrilege had effectually shaken the very altar of 
our country's liberties — tliat the foundations of. the political and 
social structure had been stricken with its head. Confusion, an- 
archy, revolution, seemed to follow in the ti'ack of the assasshi. But 
we liave faith in the soundness and saneness of the heart of the 
American people. Even froni this staggering stroke it Avill recover, 
and address itself, we earnestly believe, as calmly as before, to the 
great work of composing the disordered and embittered elements of 
our national life to peace and harmony. 

Andrew Johnson is President. Let us hope that the men of rea- 
son and statesmanship around him, rather than the men of passion 
and extreme opinions, will be chosen as his influential counsellors ; 
that the sacred obligation upon him to follow the path indicated and 
entered upon by his dead predecessor, will be sacredly honored. 
His antecedents were formed among associations which tended to 
make the Constitution and tlie fundamental principles of American 
government and liberty, paramount and dear to his mind. We 
hope and believe he will be true to these. We trust him. Let all 
true men and patriots, forgetting, in this dark hour of the Republic, 
party prejudices and proclivities, give him their support and prayers. 

The chief danger attending the assassination of President Lincoln, 
was that the madness of the murder Avould stir up a counter-mad- 
ness in the minds of the loyal people. We rejoice to believe that 
the danger is past. Sorrow is the master passion of the country, 
and the moment cannot come now, Avhen grief might be transformed 
into the hideous spirit of uiuliscriminating revenge. L^niversally 
the childishness, the Avickedncss, is recognized, of those few Avho 
would make the awful crime of one or two or a score of persons a 
pretext for wholesale vengeance toward a people — a plea for re- 
versing a policy established by tlie lamented dead and for inaugu- 
rating a course which would entail a generation of strife and misery 
upon the country, and disgrace upon the American name. 

Let the nation sorrow, though not without hope, for one wlio 
served it, to the best of his ability and knowledge, faithfully. Let 



12 

it cherish the memory of the dead, and vindicate outraged justice 
and humanity in the person of his murderer. But above all, let it 
take the spirit of its departed leader to be its guide in the difficult 
and stormy future before it. " lie, being dead, yet speaketh." In 
the name of the murdered Abraham Lincoln, we conjure the loyal 
people to imitate the calmness, the kindness, the quiet wisdom he 
exemplified — to pursue the generous, enlightened, politic course he 
had inaugurated Avith reference to the great problem now confront- 
ing the country. 

The following formed tlie leading article in the Exjpress 
on Monday, April I7tli: 

XXOW reverently Abraliam Lincoln was loved by the American 
-^^ People ; how much they had leaned upon the strengtli of his 
heroic character, in the great trial through which he led them ; how 
perfect a trust they reposed in his wisdom, his integrity, his patriot- 
ism and the fortitude of his faithful heart ; how great a space he filled 
in all the constitution of their hopes, they ha^e 'now been made to 
know as they did not know before. The shock of consternation, 
grief, and horror, which revealed it to them, was undoubtedly the 
most profound that ever fell upon a peoj)le. It shook this nation 
like an earthquake. The strong men of America we])t together like 
children. Never, do we believe, was there exhibited such a spec- 
tacle of manly tears, wrung from stout hearts by bitter anguish, as 
every street of every city, town and hamlet, in these LTnited States 
presented on Saturday last. Ah, there Avas a deep iilauting of love 
for Abraham Lincoln in the hearts of his countrymen ! Xoble soul, 
honest heart, wise statesman, njiright magistrate, braA^e old patriot, 
the nation Avas orphaned by thy death, and felt the grief of 
orphanage. 

But grief is only half the bitter passion that thrills the country 
under the aAvful blow of murder which struck down its Chief. It 
brings a fierce accomj^animent — fierce, but not altogether fierce, for 
it wears a stern solemnity. All the tender sentiment that had been 
growing up in the popular heart, under the magnanimous influence 
of victory, was steeled and hardened upon the instant. Each man 
felt, as though the assassin hand of treason was at his own throat, 



13 

the deadliuess of the conflict, and the temper of the nation under- 
went a total cliange. 

A new aspect is put upon the contest by tliis tremendous tragedy. 
Witli all that we had learned of the fiendish andim})lacable ferocity 
of the slavery-begotten treason with which we are at war, we have 
learned more in a single hour tlian all before. For this most hellish 
act is its exponent. In this murder of men, we taste biit the con- 
centrate essence of the venom which inspired the whole attempt of 
the murder of the nation. We know it now. We know now what 
the Richmond editor meant, two months ago, when he spoke with 
mystery of a blow to be struck that should " astound the world." 
We kftow what George Sanders meant, Avhen he whispered in the 
ear of Sala a prophecy of deeds that should " make civilization 
shudder." They meant these murders. They meant more than 
these. They meant an organized sclieme of assassination, larger 
than devilisli hate or devilish treason ever conceived before — aimed 
at the cutting down of all the nation's heads in government. 

It was Rebellion, in its corporate character, that moved and 
nerved and armed the assassins. Booth and his confederates of the 
inner circle of the monster plot Avere but the representatives and 
agents of the great Confederacy behind them. The death to which 
they have doomed themselves is but the penalty which the whole 
rebellious race invoke upon their heads by this foul deed. It is im- 
becile to talk of conciliatory lenience to such a race, and only im- 
beciles talk it any longer. Men feel that tlie iron hand of justice 
must be clenched against tliem, ungloved with any tenderness what- 
ever. 

Perhaps, in the great design of Providence, for the working out 
of the consequences of this tremendous struggle to their utmost 
end, it was needful that this awful tragedy should be enacted, to 
steel the softened temper of the people, and that Abraham Lincoln, 
his own great part performed, his fame complete, was laid a costly 
sacrifice upon the altar of that stern need. There is this thought 
in many a reverent mind ; but with this, or without it, the martte- 
DOM of Abraham Lincoln gives him a sacred memory forever. 



Tlie meeting of citizens on Saturday evening at tlie 
Merchants' Club Room, tliougli tlie call was not publislied 



14 

until late, was very largely attended. The assemblage 
was called to order by S. Y. R. WATSOaS", Esq., on whose 
nomination, Hon. E. Gr. Spaulding was chosen to preside. 
Wm. Thuestone was elected Secretary. In assuming the 
chair, Mr. Spaulden-g spoke briefly, but feelingly and elo- 
quently, of the occasion which had called the citizens to- 
gether. He paid a fi.tting tribute to the memory of the 
President, and alluded to his aquaintance with Andi'ew 
Johnson ; said he had kuoA\Ti him as a zealous, faithful 
and industrious representative, a true and upright man, 
and believed he would remain firm and carry out faithfully 
the policy of the Administration; that he would never 
yield a hair to the rascals who had been lal^oring to de- 
stroy the nation; but would stand by the government, 
whatever mio-ht betide. 

Kev. H. A. Paesons next spoke in vindication of the 
character of President Johnson. 

Rev. Dr. Heacock was then loudly called, but indisj)o- 
sition had prevented his attendance. 

Judge Clinton was the next speaker. In answer to 
a vociferous call he came forward and took the stand, 
though evidently with much umvillingness. " God 
knows," he said, " I do not wish to speak this evening." 
He was overcome with a blow more terrible than ever 
felt l)efore. It had seemed to him for a time that the 
hopes of the country had been crushed; but reflection 
had sho^vn him that he was mistaken. He did not wish 



15 

to make a speecli. He was fearful tliat, in tlie intensity 
of his feelings, lie miglit give iitterance to tliat for wliicli 
lie miglit afterward be sorry. (Cries of " Go on ! No 
danger.") Judge Clinton continued in a strain of impas- 
sioned eloquence to portray tlie murderous course pursued 
by tliose wlio have arrayed themselves against the gov- 
ernment, and concluded by declaring that " come weal, 
come woe, what little life there was left in him should be 
devoted to the support of Andrew Johnson and his ad- 
ministration." His remarks were received with a storm 
of applause, and created a profound sensation. 

Rev. J. W. Ball followed, and spoke for some time 
with eloquence and fervor in relation to the spirit that 
had fostered and encourao-ed the assassination of the Pres- 
ident. " The same spirit," he said, " had manifested itself 
in the Senate Chamber for years before." The reverend 
gentleman went on to speak in appropriate terms of the 
retril)ution to which the enemies of the country had ex- 
posed themselves, and expressed the hope that they might 
meet with a j^roper punishment. 

S. M. CiiAMBERLAm, Esq., moved that a committee of 
ten be appointed to make the necessary arrangements for 
the observance of the 20th. day of April in a solemn and 
becoming manner. 

A. Sheewood, Esq., moved, as an amendment, that a 
committee of five be appointed to co-operate with com- 
mittees to be appointed by the Board of Trade and Com- 
mon Council. 



16 

Mr. CiiAMBEELAiN accepted tlie amendment, and tlie 
motion as amended was adopted. 

The Chair appointed the following gentlemen as such 
committee: Brig.-Gen. E,. L. Howard, chairman; Pascal 
P. Pratt, George W. Clinton, S. S. Jewett and Wm. H. 
Glenny. 

After some additional remarks from Mr. Spaulding, 
in which all were exhorted to return to their homes with 
renewed determination to perform their duties as loyal 
citizens, and to stand hj the Government to the last, the 
meeting adjourned. 

On the Sabbath succeeding the death of the President, 
Rev. Dr. Lord delivered the following discourse in the 
Central Presbyterian Church. The church was filled to 
its utmost caj)acity, and the earnest, impassioned words 
of the eloquent divine were such as are seldom heard. 

The text selected for the occasion was " The Lord God 
Omnipotent reigneth." — Rev. xix. 6. 

delivered by eev. de. lord, on the occasion? of the death 
op president lincoln", at the central presbyterian church, 

APRIL 16, 1865. 

REPORTED BY H. W. BOX, ESQ. 

~OEH0LD in this sad drapery, in this national flag clad with the 
-■^ emblems of Avoe, the outward tokens of the irrejiressible grief 
of a great nation weeping over the death of its beloved and vener- 
ated President. The words of David concerning Abner, struck 
down by an assassin, sound over the chasm of thirty centuries 



17 

tlirougli this church and ten thousand churches over all the land, 
" Know ye not that there is a great man fallen this day in Israel ? 
Who was like to him in Israel ? How are the mighty fallen and 
the Aveapons of war perished." From the height of gladness, in 
the midst of joyful tidings the nation is plunged into the deepest 
grief We looked for joy, but behold sorrow, — for judgment and 
behold a cry, — for peace and lo ! not war alone, but murder, most 
foul, most horrible. We thought we saw out of a darkness of four 
years' duration, the beams of the rising sun, and lo ! the pall of 
midnight gathers over the sky, and instead of thanksgiving and 
praise, we are called to mourning, lamentation and woe. THE 
PRESIDENT OF THE UXITED STATES HAS FALLEN 
BY THE BLOW OF AN" ASSASSIN ; the sick chamber of the 
Secretary of State has been invaded, and a dagger thrice thrust into 
his body after the murderous felling of his attendants. No wonder 
the nation is horrified as these tidings pass along from city to city, 
from hamlet to hamlet. No wonder the stoutest-hearted tremble, 
and the strong man bows himself to conceal his tears, and the cry 
of a whole people goes up to God, " How long, O Lord, will thou 
not judge and avenge their blood? " Three hundred thousand mar- 
tyrs fallen in this war for law and liberty greet the advent of their 
chief in the world of spirits and hail him as the noblest victim of 
them all. God grant he may be the last. 

I do not believe such a crime has been committed in a thousand 
years, perhaps not since the day of the murder on Calvary, when 
the heavens darkened and the earth staggered, and the dead arose 
as the God-man Mediator hung upon the cross. No human death 
can, indeed, be likened to that of Him who died for our sins upon 
the cruel Tree, but it may serve as a comparison to mark degrees of 
guilt in all lesser crimes. 

" Besides this man 
Hath borne his faculties so meek, hath been 
So clear in his great office, that his virtues 
Will plead like angels, trumpet-tongued, against 
The deep damnation of his taking off ; 
And pity, like a naked new-born babe. 
Striding the blast, or heaven's cherubim, hors'd. 
Upon the sightless couriers of the air. 
Shall blow the horrid deed in every eye, 
That tears shall drown the wind." 



18 

I do not look xxpon the murder of the President as an act of mere 
private vengeance; it was a blow aimed at the people who elected 
him and at the principles he represented. He could not have had a 
personal enemy. He was among the mildest and most humane of 
men, genial, generous, unwilling to shed blood, interposing his pre- 
rogative of mercy when he possibly could without danger to the 
country, and erring, when he did err, on the side of compassion ; a 
man of unassuming manners, without pride or haughtiness, acces- 
sible always to the poorest suppliant, harboring no revengeful feel- 
ing toward any, incapable of a cruel word or act, — such a man 
could have no personal enmities. He was hated as the representa- 
tive of Northern men, of free principles, as the head of a nation de- 
fending its life against an unprovoked and utterly wicked rebellion, 
whose sole ol)ject was to perpetuate a detestable slave Oligarchy 
which sought to enthrone itself upon the ruins of free institutions, 
free labor, free soil, and free speech, Mr. Lincoln was threatened 
with assassination on his way to Wasliington at his first inaugural, 
before he could have done any act to excite personal enmity. 

The threat has hung over him ever since, not so much as the man 
Abraham Lincoln, as the President of the United States, and now 
the blow has fallen after four years of unparalleled trial and labor, 
after wearisome days and wearisome nights, and all the perplexity 
of a doubtful war; after having endured burdens which would have 
killed most men, and exhibited a devoted patriotism and an unex- 
pected and extraordinary ability, which twenty years hence will be 
acknowledged by his bitterest political opponents. After the suc- 
cessful termination of the war by the surrender of Richmond and 
the capture of Lee's whole army, and while he was revolving 
measures for the restoration of the South, his heart full of kind- 
ness and good-will to the fallen foe, while he was engaged in 
making their fall as light as possible, he is basely assassinated in 
the presence of a thousand people, the miirderer crying out the 
ancient motto of Virginia, with au open dagger in his hand, " sic 
semper tyrannis f^ 

What a grim burlesque was this ! It was the tyrant who held 
the dagger, it was Hampden who fell. " Sic semper tyrannis " is 
the proper motto to be inscribed upon the tomb of the slaveholders' 
rebellion, while round the monument of our martyred President a 
grateful people will hang the broken chains of four millions of 



19 

slaves, and pilgrims of freedom from every laud of every coming 
age will crown it Avith their votive oiferings. 

The President's recent inaugural seems now to have heen a pro- 
l^hetic utterance of one apjiointed to die. Its solemn religious tone, 
its abnegation of all personal merit or praise, its sublime reference 
to the justice of God, and appeal to His decision, was " an anointing 
for his burial." It suggested on its first perusal the words of a 
poet : 

His voice sounds like a prophet's word, 

And in its solemn tones are lieard 

The thanks of millions yet to be. 

Its closing words Avill be read in every language and by every 
people to the end of time: 

"FOXDLY DO WE HOPE, FERVENTLY DO WE PKAY, THAT THIS 
MIGHTY SCOURGE OF WAR MAY SOOX PASS AWAY. YeT, IF GOD 
WILLS THAT IT CON^TINUE UNTIL ALL THE W^EALTH PILED BY THE 
bondman's two hundred AND FIFTY YEARS OF UNREQUITED TOIL 
SHALL BE SUNK, AND UNTIL EVERY DROP OF BLOOD DRAWN WITH THE 
LASH SHALL BE PAID AVITH ANOTHER DRAAVN AVITH THE SAVORD, AS 
WAS SAID THREE THOUSAND YEARS AGO, SO, STILL IT MUST BE SAID : 
" THE JUDGMENTS OF THE LORD ARE TRUE AND RIGHTEOUS ALTO- 
GETHER." 

The ruffian Avho slew him embodied the rcA'cnge and malice of 
the leaders of this revolt against the government and the institu- 
tions of the United States. Exasperated by utter defeat, and ren- 
dered furious by the bloAvs of Grant, Sherman, Thomas and Sheri- 
dan, the broken Confederacy Avas. the Avounded serpent writhing 
under the heel of the A'ictor, striking its venomous fangs into its foe 
Avith a last dying hiss. 

But hoAvever gricA'Ous this calamity may be, hoAveA'er sad the re- 
moval of our President at such a time as this, Avhen he Avas about 
to receive the rcAvard of his noble patriotism, his herculean labors 
and his innumerable perplexities, we are not Avithout consolation. 
The Republic suiwiA^es ! Our A^ctorious Generals and their noble ar- 
mies, our invincible naAy, and the officers, surviAC, and hold and 
Avill hold all that they have Avon. If avc take up the old Hebrew 
lamentation, "How is the strong staff broken and the beautiful 
rod," Ave know that God the .ludge and the Avenger still lives and 
reigns. As the A'oice " of many Avaters and of mighty thunderings" 
2 



20 

there comes to us in this providence tlie solemn annunciation " the 
Lord God Omnipotent reigneth," and its hmguage to us is, " Put 
not your trust in man." It reminds us of our dependence. It tells 
us in our bereavement that He who guided our councils and gave 
victory to our armies, is yet the ruler of nations and will perfect 
his work. 

The folly no less than the wickedness of the murder of President 
Lincoln is very apparent, for clemency was one of his chief charac- 
teristics. The rebels could not have selected in all the Government 
one so likely to deal leniently with them, so disposed to forgiveness, 
so ready to forego the claim of justice in all possible cases, so in- 
clined, as possibly to err, on the side of mercy. His death intro- 
duces to the Chief Magistracy of the nation Andrew Johnson, of 
Tennessee, himself personally so great a sufferer from the tyranny 
of the Southern Rebels, that it will be hard for him to forgive. 
They have killed a friend to put an enemy in his place, one who 
knows them too well, and has suftered by them too much, to be 
cajoled or flattered into a remission of the penalty. God, as it 
seems to us, has taken away the kind and amiable Chief Magistrate 
when he has done his work, and put a stern judge in his place. So 
much we may discover, though "His way is in the sea, and His 
pathway in the great Avaters, and His footsteps are not known." 
I do not mean by this that Mr. Johnson, who is now the President 
of the United States, is a hard or revengeful man. I believe him, in 
the disgraceful scene at the Capital, to have been the victim of a 
conspiracy ; we have the evidence that he had enemies in Washing- 
ton ripe for any villainy. His record as Governor of Tennessee and 
Senator of the United States, shows him to be an able man and a 
true pati'iot, and patriotism in the South means something, because 
it costs something. His words at the first formal meeting of his 
Cabinet are most significant ; he said that at present he saw no 
necessity for an extra session of Congress, and further, that he 
would not commit himself to a policy Avhich woiild prevent visiting 
condign punishment upon traitors. He had been fighting rebels 
here and in Tennessee, and his previous course might be regarded 
as an indication of his future conduct upon this siibject. 

God has in this a purpose, and as He left the Southern slavehold- 
ers to destroy slavery by their own act, so now He has left them in 
their murderous, devilish and insane rage to assassinate the merciful 



21 

nm\ kind Noi'tlicni Magistrate and given tlieni a Soutlicrn Judge. 
If " his little finger " should prove " tiacker " than his jn-edeccssor's 
" loins," they "will be compelled to remember that the threatened, 
j testified and finally accomplished assassination of Friday last was 
the fruit of their own devices. God has sniFered them to kill the son 
of Consolation to give them a son of Thunder. 

If President Lincoln had not done his work he would have been 
spared to the People. Xo weapon forged against him could pros- 
per, no murderous plan prevail while God had need of him, while 
his life was essential to tlie nation. Dotli not the Lord God Omnipo- 
tent reign? "Who kept the pistol and the dagger from our lamented 
President for more than four years? His life was always threat- 
ened ; there has not been an hour since his first inaugural when there 
was not a conspiracy to murder him; men bound themselves by oath 
as in the days of Paul to kill him — but not until he reached the 
munber of his months, not until his Avork was done, could the assas- 
sins prevail. And as surely as the Lord God Omnipotent reignetli, 
so surely he has something for Andrew Johnson to do, or He Avould 
not in his providence have placed him in the Presidential chair. 

I do not suppose the entire South are involved in the guilt of this 
detestible crime — but there is a class at the South, represented by 
the men who fired the city of New York, and committed robbery 
and murder at St. Albans, who are responsible for this crime. When 
an amiable and skillful physician, a man of high literary standing, 
went from this city some three years since as a surgeon, he became 
a correspondent of one of our city papers. He had a charge of rebel 
prisoners, and in one of his communications he said, after sjoeaking 
of the poor whites kindly, that there was a class who ouglit not 
to be sufiered to live. Some of our citizens expressed surprise at 
such a declaration coming from Dr. Hunt. It was no enigma to 
me, for during my residence South I saw something of this class, 
and I said then, and now say, tliat they were, and are dangerous at 
any time and in any community. Before they commenced this war 
and expended their Avratli and malice and malignity upon us, they 
were slaughtering each other. They were the hangers on to the 
slaveholders, half educated, poor and wholly insolent, "full of mur- 
der, debate, deceit, and malignity," always armed and always ready 
for a deadly quarrel. Men not mer^Jy " wanting principle and 
wanting bread," like Northern demagogues, but full of active malice, 



22 

ready to stab a man for a word; not merely duelists, but assassins, 
with no regard whatever for human life. These villians have been 
the authors of this war, they have been made officers of comi^anies 
and regiments in the Southern army, and in them has been and is 
the virus of the rebellion. Our murdered prisoners, whose blood 
cries aloud from the ground to God for vengeance, were their 
victims. 

It is not likely that Secretary Seward, if he survives, will be able 
longer to serve his country in the arduous post of Secretary of State. 
Perhaps no man in the land was so qualified for the position he has 
occupied during the war as Mr. Seward. His suavity, his ingenuity, 
his subtlety, together with his great ability, made him more than a 
match for the ablest diplomatists of Europe. More than any other 
man, he has kept foreign war from our doors, and his services have 
been continued until the danger was past by the overturn of the re- 
bellion. If he is laid aside, it is because his work is done, and be- 
cause others may do that which remains. 

There is a solemn significance in the removal of President Lincoln 
in such a manner, and at such a time. The Lord God Omnipotent, 
who reigneth in the armies of Heaven and among the inhabitants of 
the earth, teaches us the instability of fortune, and the uncertainty 
of life. Our President was in a position which commanded the at- 
tention and the homage of the world. Newly elected by an over- 
whelming vote, his administration approved and his acts confirmed 
by the people — recently inaugurated the second time, with the 
plaudits and blessings of the nation, there seemed nothing necessary 
to his felicity but the final overthrow of the insurrection which has 
so long and persistently assaulted the national life. This consum- 
mation was vouchsafed to him; the fall of Richmond and the sur- 
render of Lee substantially closed the war, and President Lincoln 
might have said, "Lord, now lettest Thou Thy servant depart in 
peace." Yet he was in the prime of life — in the vigor of his years. 
There was before him the promise of a glorious future. A half rail- 
lion of gallant soldiers, flushed with victory, were under his orders, 
any one of whom would have interposed his body and given his life 
to shield the President from the shot of an assassin; — he was en- 
throned in the hearts of millions of ])eo'p\e, whose love and rever- 
ence were seen in the tears and j^rayers and lamentations with which 
they received the news of his death. But no prayers, no tears, no 



23 

gallaut defenders could save liim Avlien the number of his days 
was reached. We hear a voice from heaven saying: "Boast not 
thyself of to-morrow." " Verily every man at his best estate is 
altogether vanity." 

" The glories of our birth and state 
Are shadows, not substantial things ; 
There is no armor against fate ; 
Death lays his icy hands on kings. 
Sceptre and crown 
Must tumble down, 
And in the dust be equal made 
With the poor, crooked scytho and spade." 

There is another solemn proof of the necessity of the war, and 
that the Lord God Omnipotent who reigneth has sufiered it for a, 
just purpose and to a Avise end; whatever might have been thought 
of American slavery before the war, and whatever apology might 
have been honestly made for it, events which have occurred within 
the last four years have served to show that its influence has been 
vitterly barbarizing. The conduct of the enemy at Bull Run was 
most vindictive and unscrupulous, and the most brutish acts were 
peri^etrated upon our prisoners and our dead, to gratify "their base 
and ferocious passions. Some of our unfortunate men had been 
buried in an inhuman manner, while from others, skulls and bones 
had been taken and fashioned into cups and ornaments for Southern 
ladies. Xo such atrocity has been recorded in history for live hun- 
dred years, and now the brutal murder of the President, and the 
murderous assault upon Mr. Seward and his family, constitutes the 
last croAvning acts of their brutality. If these things have not their 
root and Aims in slaA'ery, Avhence are they? The people of the South- 
ern States are of the same race. They have the same Bible — the 
same common laAV with Christianity for its basis. Whence then 
this monstrous cruelty — this beastly barbarism? 

Had the South succeeded they Avould have made shiA^ery perpet- 
ual and aggressi\'e and perhaps dominant ; and Avhat could have been 
the result but the barbarism of the entire continent, a return to the 
dark ages, an obliteration of the reforms and the progress of a thou- 
sand years? God, Avho planted this nation and sifted all Eiirope for 
three hundred years to colonize the New World with a peculiar peo- 



24 

pie, a chosen generation and a royal priesthood, to furnish an exam- 
ple to the down-trodden nations of a free Church and free State, 
could not suifer this purpose to be defeated. The Mayflower was 
not saved from shipwreck in her ])assage across the stormy Atlan- 
tic ; our fathers were not delivered from the pestilence that swept 
off the savage foe lying in ambush for their lives; they did not en- 
dure poverty and famine in the land of their exile, to have their 
divinely appointed work crushed under the heel of a remorseless 
slaveocracy. Hence this war — hence its result — hence the martyr- 
dom of our beloved President, which nmst serve to fasten in every 
mind an everlasting abhorrence of a system producing such effects, 
and Avhich will lead ever}^ father in the land to swear his children 
to an undying hatred to every form of servitude, as Hamilcar swore 
, Hannibal upon the altars of Carthage to eternal hatred to Rome. 

Brethren, fellow-citizens, and friends, let us not be utterly cast 
down, for the Lord God Omnipotent reigneth. He guides the whirl- 
wind and directs the storm. He brings good out of evil and light 
out of darkness. He causes the wrath of men to j^raise Him, and re- 
strains the remainder. Let us thank God that he has spared our 
venerated President so long, and permitted him to behold on the 
mount of a sure anticipation the promised Canaan of peace and 
fixinion. As Moses the leader and law-giver of the Hebrews was 
i shown the promised land, and yet not suffered to enter, so God gave 
I President Lincoln a view of coming glory from captured Eichmond, 
1 and then called him to his rest. Our murdered President needs no 
eulogy, for his works do follow him. He has been our God-given 
pilot through the storm of war, and brought us in sight of the port 
of peace. 

j If Geoi'ge Washington was the father of his country, Abraham 
'Lincoln is its restorer. He has been the representative man of his 
day in the battle for freedom. He has a monument more durable 
than brass in the hearts of the American people. He needs no mar- 
ble, no emblazoned escutcheon, — he lives forever in history, and is 
henceforth enrolled in the records of mankind among the great mar- 
tyrs of liberty. The sturdy yeomen of the land from whom he de- 
scended, and who placed him in power, and the grateful slaA'es whose 
bonds he sundered, will guard his name and fame with sleepless 
vigilance, and point their descendants to his grave as the shrine of 
American freedom. God grant that he may be the last, as he is 



25 

the most illustrious victim of that vast army Avho have Mien for 
freedom; that this last and noblest sacrifice may consummate the 
work of expiation for a nation's guilt. 

As the illustrious dead has gone to give an account of the deeds 
done in the body — to answer to the responsibilities of the wide 
sphere of action and the large stcAvardship committed to him, so 
every one of us shall soon pass to the same dread tribunal, to re- 
ceive a judgment according to our works; for he Avho had one tal- 
ent, is represented by our Lord as called to account with him that 
had ten, and condemned because he had hidden his Lord's money! 
Happy and blessed are they who have taken sanctuary in Him who 
is as "the shadow of a great rock in a weary land;" " who died for 
our sins, and rose again for our justification;" " who is able to save 
to the uttermost all that come unto God by Ilini:" who gave one 
hour of triumph to the powers of darkness, that he might win for 
us eternal redemption from Death and Hell; exclaiming, as he as- 
cended in triumph, bearing gifts for men, " O death, I will be thy 
plagues! O grave, I will be thy destruction! " 

Concerning " our strong rods l)roken and Avithercd,'^ we may con- 
clude with the ancient lamentation of Moses, the man of God, re- 
corded in the ninetieth Psalm: "Thou turneth man to destruction; 
and sayest, Return, ye children of men. Thou carricst them away 
as with a flood; they are as a sleep; in the morning they are like 
grass which groweth up. In the morning it flourisheth, and grow- 
eth up; in the evening it is cut down, and withereth. For we are 
consumed by thine anger, and by thy wrath are Ave troubled. Re- 
turn, O Lord, how long? and let it repent thee concerning thy ser- 
vants. O satisfy us early with thy mercy ; that Ave may rejoice and 
be glad all our days. Make us glad according to the days Avherein 
thou hast afflicted us, and the years AA'herein Ave have seen evil. Let 
thy Avork appear unto thy servants, and thy glory unto their chil- 
dren. And let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us: and es- 
tablish thou the Avork of our hands u})on us ; yea, the Avork of our 
hands, establish thou it." 

On Sunday morning, at tlie Nortli Presbyterian Cliurch, 
tlie pastor, Rev. Henry Smitli, D. D., made tlie follo^ving 
remarks : 



26 



BEFORE THE SERilON^. 

"ORETHREN" axd Friexds: If ray heart were not already pro- 
-'-^ foimdly oppressed and troubled, the weeping heavens, yonder 
drooping banners of the Republic, this pulpit and the walls of this 
temple of God draped in black, yea, the sorrowful countenances be- 
fore me, would sufficiently admonish me that we meet this morning 
under the dark shadow of a great national calamity. Sympathizing 
myself most deeply and fully in your grief, I needed no such admoni- 
tion. Knowing from my own, the conflicting and struggling emo- 
tions which agitate your breasts, I have even doubted whether to 
address you at all. It is yet too early to give to these tumultuous 
feelings an interpretation, much more is it too early to give to them 
an appropriate expression. But can we bear to speak or to think 
of anything else? My friends, Abraham Lincoln is dead; but the 
Almighty Ruler of the imiverse still lives. The administration of 
Abraham Lincoln, the fother of a regenerated country, the first mar- 
tyr President in the cause of American liberty, is at an end : but the 
holy government of God, and the laws of his glorious and univer- 
sal empire still survive. Yea, Christ and the precepts of his blessed 
gospel still remain. The responsibilities and duties of the living fol- 
lowers of Christ, lifted from him who is now with God, still rest 
upon us. I do not desire to divert from their natural channel the 
full currents of your grief. But in the circumstances of the case, 
can we do better than to turn away our thoughts for a few minutes, 
from man to God ? from the condition of our earthly coimtry to 
the princijiles and precepts of that spiritual realm which is revealed 
to us in the gospel? I have, therefore, resolved to preach to you 
a short discourse, which I w^as preparing for tlie day, before the in- 
telligence of the sad calamity, which has befiillen us, had reached our 
ears; adding at the close such an application to our present national 
circumstances as the suddenness and horror of this awful tragedy per- 
mits to one whose thoughts and feelings are as deeply agitated as 
your own. 

AT THE CLOSE OF THE SERMOX. 

Cheistiaj^ Brethren: This is the first occasion on Avhich I have 
been Avith you since the fall of Richmond, and it is the holy Sabbath 
succeeding a week in which our hearts had been thrilled by the 
news of the surrender of the chief army which sustained the rebel- 



27 

lion of tlio South against our nafional government. Tliis glorious 
news had lifted the whole nation into the sphere of rapture; into a 
mood of mind "svliieh could find no adequate expression except in a 
repetition of the song of the angels at the advent of the prince of 
peace : " Glory to God in the highest; on earth peace and good-will 
to men." I should not have met your expectations, nor done justice 
to my own emotions, if I had purposely omitted at least to allude 
to these tidings of great joy. They are, indeed, tidings of great 
joy, not merely to lis, as a nation, hut to all the world, for hoAvever 
ill-appreciated they may he, by large portions of mankind, who do 
not yet understand the methods by which Christ's kingdom is to come 
on the earth, the great events which tliey herald are in fact a }iart 
of those glorious triumphs by which the kingdom, and the greatness 
of the kingdom under the whole heaven, are to be given to the peo- 
ple of the Saints of the Most High God. 

We stand to-day before the King of heaven, aghast, astonished, 
paralyzed, a nation without a head. The national heart has ceased 
to beat, and our tongue cleaves to the roof of our mouth. Yonder 
in the capital lies the body of our President, cold in death; and by 
his side, if still living, the gasping form of his chief counsellor, the 
Secretary of State, victims alike of a Satanic plot of desperate treach- 
ery and vengeance. Never before, since William the Silent fell 
pierced by the slugs of Belthazar Gerard, has so horrible a crime 
shocked the sensibilities of the civilized world. Never before has so 
a\vful and so purposeless a tragedy been enacted upon the high thea- 
tre of a nation's life. It is the expiring sting of the dragon of treason, 
venomous and vindictive even in its death throes. It is yet tool 
early to read its full meaning, or to calculate its full results. We 
trusted that it had been he who should fully have redeemed our Is- 
rael. But " my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither your ways 
my ways, saith the Lord. Be still, and know that I am God. Put 
not your trust in princes, nor in the son of man, in whom there is 
no help. His breath goeth forth ; he returneth to his earth ; in that 
very day his thoughts perish. Ha})py is he that hath the God of 
Jacob for his help, Avhose hope is in the Lord his God, which made 
heaven and earth, the sea and all that therein is ; which kee])eth 
truth forever ; which executeth judgment for the oppressed ; which 
giveth food to the hungry. The Lord looseth the i)risoners; the 
Lord raiseth them that are bowed down. The Lord lovetli tlic 



28 

rigiiteous. He relievetli the fatherless and the Avidow ; but the way 
of the wicked he turneth upside down. The Lord shall reign for- 
ever ; even thy God, O Zion, unto all generations." 

My friends, we are to be saved and purified as a nation. I have 
no doubt of it. But God is to do it, not man. He will claim all 
the glory, and yield no portion of it to his instruments. God's liand 
was in the very wickedness which plotted and begun this terrible 
war; overruling it for the accomplishment of his great designs of 
mercy; God's hand has conducted it, leading us, both rulers and 
people, by a path we dreamed not of; God's hand has cut it short 
in righteousness, has brought it to a conclusion, which, awful and 
' unexpected as it is, we may be 'sure will vindicate alike his justice 
and his mercy: will impress upon the nation, as no other event 
could have done, that he is the real governor, guide and protector 
of the Republic : challenging, as nothing else could have done, our 
recognition of his presence, and our obedience to the laws of his 
jholy and universal empire. Even that dear heart, which now has 
ceased to beat, Avent before the nation in this reverent acknowledg- 
ment of God : humbly owned that he had been led in his adminis- 
tration by a higher than any human hand, and by a way which his 
own wisdom could never have devised. In the midst of the bitter, 
tears of disappointment and sorrow, which have so suddenly flood- 
ed the national heart, in the full tide of jubilant rejoicings, let us re- 
member liis profound acknowledgment of God's hand in the conduct 
of our national affairs ; and so lar forth, at least, let us follow his 
example. Thankful to God for all he has enabled him to accom- 
plish for the deliverence of the Republic from the machinations of 
treason, let us henceforth seat ourselves at the feet of this higher 
than any human teachers. 

How solemn the emphasis, which this act of inliuman treachery 
and blood, deeper dyed in guilt than any regicide in the history 
of the world, adds to the second word, with which it was my orig- 
inal purpose to conclude this discourse. That word was, that in 
their civil relations and their civil actions, the followers of Christ 
are to be holy. We are to keep ourselves unspotted from the 
world. We are to acknowledge God, and the laws of liis holy king- 
dom, in our civil relations and in our civil actions, no less than in 
all the other relations and acts of our earthly lives. God has 
taught us, O by Avhat sad and solemn and bloody lessons of na- 



29 

tional retribution and. suffering, that lie is the God of nations as 
well as of individuals. God has taught us that when the wiclced 
rule, tliejieo2)le mourn. If the events of the last foiir terrihle years, 
if this awful and concluding tragedy of the war, does not burn that 
lesson into our very soul, we must be brutish indeed. AVliatever 
may have been true of us in the ])i\st.) if we have any capacity to 
learn in the school of Providence, we are no longer to be seduced 
by the sophistry of demagogues and placemen to talk about policy, 
to ignore justice : in the election of rulers, we are no longer to talk 
about availability, and ignore rectitude and the moralities of life as 
necessary qualifications in candidates for civil office. "We owe all 
the horrors and sufferings of this war to bad men in power. Trea- 
son commenced its work in the capital, by joe/;/^?*^/. It has finished 
its work, and thank God its own execrable life as well, by the cts- 
sassination in the capital of the most benign and clement as well as 
pure-hearted, righteous and venerated Chief Magistrate of the na- 
tion. Above all this awful scene of wickedness, woe and death, sat, 
and still sits, the avenging Nemesis of divine and eternal retribu- 
tion. The strokes of God have f illen, we may be sure, with an un- 
erring aim. True, indeed, the heaviest blow of the divine justice 
have fallen upon that section of the country whose corrupt leaders 
plotted and attempted to consummate the destruction of the na- 
tion's life. But the terrible woes which the loyal States have suf- 
fered, terminating in the fearful tragedy which, on Friday night, 
robbed the nation of its head, ought to teach us that God has had, 
and still has, somewliat against us also. What that " somewhat 
is, how light or how heavy tlie national guilt which it involves, we 
will not to-day any further inquire. From the stunning blow which 
has fallen upon us we have not yet sufficiently recovered distinctly 
to read the lessons which it was designed to teach. Our hearts are 
too troubled and sorrowful for calm and consecutive thought. But i 
let us at least acknowledge that the hand of God is pressing heavily I 
upon us. Let us at least endeavor to obey the admonition of his 
word: In the day of prosperity rejoice; but in the day of adversity 
consider. Let us humble ourselves imder the afflictive hand of tlie 
Almighty, and whilst we mingle our sympathetic tears Avitli those 
of the heart-stricken families of our slaughtered rulers, and our pat- 
riotic tears with those of a whole peo})le boAved down under the 
weight of a great national sorrow, let us humbly and penitently im- 



30 

plore Mm to make us understand the lessons which he designs to 
teach us by this awful event. Let us confess before him the sins of 
the nation: especially that great sin — our national forgetfulness of 
God. Let us seek his grace to enable us to put far from iis in the 
future, everything in our individual and national life which has 
offended him in the past. Let us pray. 

On Sunday evening, at tlie Lafayette Street Presby- 
terian Cliurcli, after tlie usual introductory ser^dces, at 
the request of Dr. Heacock, tlie story of tlie assassination 
of William tlie Silent was read by Rev. Mr. Furman. 
Dr. Heacock tlien offered a few remarks. He said : 

X REFER first to the historic instance which has just been read, 
^ in order to check tlie desperate thoughts which the feeling that 
nothing like this crime — the assassination of our noble President — 
lias ever occurred in human history, would jDrovoke. Fiendish ma- 
lignity and hate have found such exj>ression before. Nor is such an 
event as this to darken into solitary gloom the fate of a good man. 
The goo'd and the great have fallen by just such dastardly means 
before. Li the words which accompanied this bloody act, there was 
evidenced a mind as stolid and pointless as it was brutal : " Sic semper 
tyrannis." Tliese words uttered to justify the murder of a constitu- 
tional President, administering a free and written Constitution ! Had 
the poor wretch flourished any otlier shred of Latin it would have 
been quite as applicable. No good man dies before his time, " we 
are immortal till our work is done." Our murdered President has 
gone to join and complete the glorious roll of our martyrs in this 
war ; to lay his honored dust beside the humblest grave of the hum- 
blest soldier of the Republic. 

My friends, let us breathe no spirit of revenge either against the 
authors of this guilty treason or this atrocious assassination. Yet 
let us beware of those who are seeking for the most selfish of pur- 
poses to excite sympathy for this treason and its authors. God for- 
bid that the Christian pulpit should ever be left to utter any words 
Avliich would be approved by those most mercenary enemies of their 
country, the iSTorthern sympathizers with Southern treason. It has 



31 

been said tlie South was provoked to all tliis. Who provoked them 
to starve our prisoners? shoot our soldiers who had surrendered? 
or to assassinate our good and great Chief Magistrate ? 

It is said that this sad event has killed the spirit of i)arty. Ah! 
to destroy that our murdered President, I believe, would freely die 
again. With slavery dead and the bad spirit of party dead the coun- 
try is surely redeemed ! It is said the South has slain its best friend : 
to such madness God has left them at every step of their course. 
" Whom the gods would destroy they first make mad." 

Yet let us not think God has abandoned this land. He has great 
and rich purposes of mercy toward it. The prayers of the fathers 
and all its history assure this. Let us fear not. He who gave to 
ns such a man as him we mourn can raise us up others in our need. 

After tlie singing of a liynin : 

" Servant of God well done," 

Dr. Lord next addressed tlie crowded congregation. 

The irrepressible sympathy of tlie audience 1 jroke out in 
expressions wliicli yet seemed not at all inconsistent with 
the gravity of the occasion, the time or the place. It 
seemed like an audible, reverent Amen, though it took 
another form. We have never heard Dr. Lord exceed 
himself in the words of this evening. The substance of 
his address is given in another part of this pamphlet, 
though it was not a mere repetition of himself, 1)ut he 
spoke as one out of a full heart. 

Dr. Lord was followed in most earnest, ringing, elo- 
quent words, by Rev. Mr. Plumb, of Chelsea, Mass., who 
presented some of the moral aspects of this dread crime 
and the need of sustaining the sentiment of public and 
governmental justice in the punishment of high crimes. 



32 

After wliicli — witli one more tender tliouo-lit of tlie 
tlie pale, sad, silent face of our dead President as lie lay 
in tlie quiet sleep of deatli in tlie still cliambers of tlie 
Federal mansion — and with a hymn of holy trust : 

"0 God, our hell) in ages jiast," etc., etc.: — 

after the Christian benediction by Dr. Lord — the vast 
assembly slowly dispersed. Never had there been such a 
day in that sanctuary. 

THE B OAUD OF TRADE. 

At the opening of the Board on Saturday morning, the 
President, S. H. Fish, Esq., called the members to order, 
saying, " All know the solemn circumstances under which 
we meet ; no tongue can utter a word ; every heart is 
wrung with anguish." 

L. K. Plimpton offered the following resolution : 

"O ESOLVED, That in view of the terrible calamity which has be- 
-*-^ fallen this country by the assassination of its Chief Magistrate, 
a committee of live be appointed by the President to prepare suit- 
able resolutions, expressive of the sense of this Board nnder such a 
bereavement, and jiresent the same to the Board at the usual lime 
of meeting on Monday next, and that the committee be authorized 
to drape this room with suitable insignia of mourning for thirty 
days ; and also to co-operate with other committees that may be ap- 
pointed by the Common Council or citizens in relation to this sad 
event. 

Adopted unanimously. 

The Chair appointed the following gentlemen as the 



33 

committee: — L. K. Plimj^ton, N. C. Simons, B. F. Bruce, 
J. S. Biiell, Wm. Tliurstone, L. T. Kimball. 
On motion of D. S. Bennett, 

"O ESOLVED, That the doors of this room be noAV closed and 
-*-^ draped "svitli the proper insignia of nionrning; antl that all mem- 
bers of the Board are liereby requested to suspend business for the 
day. 

Adopted unanimously. 
The Board tlien adjourned. 

On tlie following Monday, an adjourned meeting, witli 
reference to the great national calamity, was held by the 
Board of Trade. The spacious room was croA^ded to its 
utmost capacity. The hall had been beautifully and ai> 
propriately draped and decorated, the walls being nearly 
covered with the insignia of grief. The decoration was 
made under the direction of M. St. Ody, assisted l:)y a 
committee consistino; of Messrs. B. F. Bruce, Geo. T. Bent- 
ley, Wm. Tliurstone, L, T. Kiml3all, and others. 

The President of the Board, S. H. Fish, Esq., was in 
the chair and the meeting ^\^as opened with prayer by 
Eev. Dr. Lord. L. K. Plimpton, Esq., then offered the 
folloAving preamble and resolutions : 

WHEREAS, by a resolution of the Board of Trade, adopted at 
its last meeting', the undersigned were api)ointed a committee 
to prepare suitable resolutions expressive of tlie sense of this Board 
in view of tlie terrible calamity wliich had befallen tliis country by 
the assassination of its Chief Magistrate, and to drape this room Avith 
suitable insignia of mourning for thirty days, and also to co-operate 



34 

with other committees that may be appointed by the Common Coun- 
cil or citizens in relation to this sad event : your committee would 
therefore state that they have caused the Board of Trade rooms to 
be duly draped in mourning, and with great hesitation have under- 
taken, with feelings of profound sadness, and in a community of 
heart-stricken i^eojjle, to prepare such an expression as woidd faint- 
ly indicate the views and feelings of this Board in view of the great 
calamity which has overwhelmed our common country, and there- 
fore present the following for your consideration : 

Wyiereas, in view of the tragical and lamentable event which has 
appalled the people of this nation, by the assassination of our great 
and good President, and in the deadly assault upon New York's fa- 
vorite son, the wise and sagacious Secretary of State, and the mem- 
bers of his family — that it becomes us, located at the Empire Gate- 
way of the Eastern States, as citizens of Buftalo, and as members of 
the Board of Trade here assembled, to give such expression of our 
views as may be consistent and appropriate to the occasion and the 
mournful circumstances under which we are placed ; therefore, 

Mesolved, that it is with feelings of inexpressible sadness that we 
recognize the great calamity which has befallen the people of this 
country at this critical period in its history, and, as it were, in the 
hour of its triumph, by the death of Abraham Lincoln, its chosen 
Chief Magistrate, and that while we bow humbly to the Divine will 
in this removal, we can not but feel that in His good purpose He 
moves in a mysterious manner, " and that his ways are past finding 
out." 

Mesolved, that in the midst of joy and triumph, the nation is sud- 
denly called to deplore the loss of its greatest and truest friend, 
Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, stricken down in 
the fullness of life to a martyr's grave, and at a time when strongest 
in the hearts of a grateful people ; and in his death, brought about 
by the hands of a traitor assassin, the country has lost the noblest 
work of God — an honest man — and an exalted patriot — the friend 
of the poor and oppressed — the deliverer of his country — and a 
second Washington in the hearts of a sorrow-stricken people. 

Hesolved, that the citizens of Buifalo and the members of the 
Board of Trade, who admired and loved the fallen patriot and who 
have so generously sustained the holy cause he represented may 
appropriately testify their sorrow over this national calamity, and for 



35 

that purpose we will abstain from all business on Wednesday next, 
the 19th instant, and unite in dedicating the day, in the language of 
the Governor, to services appropriate to a season of national be- 
reavement. 

liesolved, that to the afflicted family o'f-our chosen and late Chief 
Magistrate we tender our heartfelt sympathies in this their, as Avell 
as their country's, hour of affliction, commending them to tlie care 
of Him who tempers the wind to the shorn lamb, who will also care 
for the widow and fatherless. 

JUcsolved, that in Andrew Johnson, the constitutional successor 
of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, we entertain 
the utmost confidence, in his integrity, his patriotism and his man- 
hood, and following in the footsteps of his illustrious predecessor, 
we hereby i^ledge ourselves to give him our undivided and unfalter- 
ing support, imploring the blessings of God to grant him that wis- 
dom in counsel, sound conservative policy, prudence as Avell as en- 
ergy of action, ijatience, single devotion to the cause of his country, 
and virtue, which characterized his lamented predecessor. 

JResolved, that we entertain the greatest solicitude for the criti- 
cal condition of our worthy and sagacious Secretary of State ; that 
we sympathise with him in his afflictions, and hope for his speedy 
restoration to health, and that the country may be favored for many 
years to come with his judicious counsel and experienced statesman- 
ship. 

Hesolved, that this Board will participate in such public demon- 
strations of respect to the memory of our deceased President as may 
be determined upon, and that a committee of five be appointed by 
the President of this Board, in the place of all other committees, to 
co-operate with similar committees from other bodies to that end. 

JResolved, that these proceedings and resolutions be recorded at 
length in the book of the minutes of this Association, and copies 
thereof be furnished to the press of the city for publication ; also, 
copies be transmitted by the Secretary of this Board to kindred 
associations. 

On motion of G. S. Hazard, Esq., the preamble and 
resolutions were unanimously adopted. 

Tlie chair appointed the following committee : — Messrs. 

3 



36 

L. K. Plimpton, G. S. Hazard, O. L. Mms, D. S. Bennett, 
and S. S. Gutlirie. 

Rev. Mr. Allison being called on, spoke as follows : 

XT can be no ordinary event which brings so many of the business 
-*~ men of this city together at this hour of the clay. Your sad 
countenances, your rooms draped with mourning, reiterate the ap- 
palling fact w^hich has thrilled the heart of this nation with a sorrow 
more poignant than we ever felt before. Yes, our noble President 
is dead, and our grief has strange elements mingled Avith it, and our 
sorrow has an unwonted tone. He fell by the hand of an assassin ! 
What a transition from the peans of joy in which the late victories 
were celebrated to the wail of sorrow now surging around the body 
of our murdered Chief Magistrate. How poor are man's words 
when God comes forth to speak to the people. It is, nevertheless, 
our duty, gentlemen, to strive to mitigate our grief with whatever 
of hope may lessen the sadness of this hour. May not blessings be 
concealed in this affliction ? 

We have had four years of civil war. Our energies have been 
devoted to one object — the overthrow of this rebellion. Y^'our 
money, your brothers, your children, have been laid upon the altar 
of your country, and during this time business has flourished, for- 
tunes have been made and a tide of imwonted commercial jDrosper- 
ity has swept over the land. Amid all this we may not have grown 
better. Our victories were possibly leading us away from Him who 
only " maketli wars to cease." To-day we witness the unusual 
sj^ectacle of strong men in tears. These tears will do the nation 
good. By the sadness of the countenance the heart is made better. 
It is a blessing to men whose thoughts are wholly given to business 
and politics to be humanized and softened, even if some great calam- 
ity be the means. 

Under free governments where every man's right to express his 
opinion is recognized there will be friction, sometimes contention, 
and occasionally strife. During a warm political canvass Ave are 
too apt, like Homer's heroes, to first quarrel and then stand apart, 
but as these same warriors were brought together by a common ca- 
lamity, so Avill w^e be brought face to face in the presence of this 
terrible affliction. Over the c'rave of our murdered President we 



37 

will forget our feuds and think only of our own and our country's 
loss. 

Mr. Lincoln's death Avill strike a chord which will vibrate to the 
ends of the earth. Other nations Avill feel it and will be prompt to 
express their abhorrence of the crime which deprived this nation 
and the world of a Avise and good man. As the subject of a coun- 
try nearer by many bonds to this nation than to any other, I hesi- 
tate not to say that causes of irritation have arisen during this re- 
bellion. Nor can I exempt from blame the government and people 
of Great Britain. This, however, is not the occasion to discuss 
these wrongs. Whatever delusion may have warped tlie views of 
Euroj^ean governments, will now be dispelled. When it is seen 
that the animus of the South can only find its legitimate expression 
in assassination, the favor with which it has been regarded abroad 
will give place to unmeasured condemnation. 

The peojile of Great Britain, especially, will be filled Avith indig- 
nation when the afilicting news reach their shores, and they will 
hasten to show their sympathy for this sorrowing land — a sympa- 
thy as deep and genuine as it has been slow and cold in the past. 

And, Mr. President, if these two great nations are drawn again 
into that close intimacy which a common ancestry, a common his- 
tory and language and religion and civilization and interest renders 
so desirable, we can not but rejoice. 

Mr. Lincoln will now be considered a martyr to the principles of 
the L^nion, and men from afiir will begin to see him in his true char- 
acter. His stern integrity, his republican simplicity, his firmness 
in the hour of trial, his sagacity as a statesman, his real excellencies 
in all the relations of life, and withal, his simple and unostentatious 
piety, will command the admiration of good men everywhere. 

The Poet Laureate of England will feel the force of his own pro- 
phetic words, Avhen he wrote of the man : 

Who makes by force bis merit known, 

And lives to clutch the golden keys, 

To mould a mighty state's decrees, 
And shape the whisper of a throne ; 
•And moving up from high to higher, 

Becomes on fortune's crowning slope 

The pillar of a people's hope, 
The centre of a world's desire. 



38 

Alas tliat the pillar is broken; but let us be thankful that the 
temple is complete, founded not on men but upon principles more 
lasting than men. This grief will hallow the nation. Four years 
in the furnace made hotter than is wont, will purge away the dross, 
will bring out the pure gold. Mr. Lincoln is not dead, the recti- 
tude of his character — the soundness of his views, and the strength 
of his administration still live. 

" Great minds can never cease ; yet have they not 
A separate estate of deathlessness, 
The future is a remnant of their life ; 
Our time is part of theirs, not theirs of ours." 

Speeches were also made by Rev. Dr. Lord, Judge 
Clintou, and others ; after wliicli tlie Doxology was sung, 
and a benediction pronounced by Mr. Allison. 



COMMON COUNCIL. 

At the regular meeting of the Common Council, on 
Monday, April 17th, the following communication was 
received from His Honor Mayor Fargo : 

Buffalo, April 17, 1865. 
To the Honorable the Common Council of the City of Buffalo : 
f~^ ENTLEMEN : — It is my melancholy duty to officially comrau- 
^^ nicate to you the intelligence that Abraham Lincoln, President 
of the United States, was assassinated on the night of the 14th inst., 
and that his funeral obsequies will take place at Washington, at 
noon on Wednesday the 19th inst. 

This sad calamity — the more distressing because it has befallen 
the nation at a time when the events of the war and the policy of 
the President gave promise of the restoration of peace — has sud- 
denly changed the joy of the peo})le to the most profound grief 
We mourn not only the loss of the Chief Executive of the Republic, 
but that in the manner of his death a blow has been struck at the 



39 

national life, and at the individual security of every citizen. I 
scarcely need suggest that the Council take suitable action in refer- 
ence to this great national bereavement, and that a committee be 
appointed to act in concert with the committees of the Board of 
Trade and the citizens, in making arrangements for the observance 
of the day designated for the funeral. 

Respectfully submitted. 

WILLIAM G. FARGO, Mayor. 

Aid. Moores moved that a committee of five be ap- 
pointed by tlie cliair to report appropriate resolutions for 
tlie consideration of this Council. Carried. 
■ Whereupon the chair apjDointed Aids. Moores, Bryant, 
Ryan, Ambrose and Burgard as such committee, who sub- 
mitted the following : 

11 THERE AS, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, 
* * has met with violent death at the hands of an assassin, actu- 
ated by motives of revenge, or by sympathy with the rebellion which 
has for four years been seeking to overthrow the government of our 
fathers, which is the rightful inheritance of ourselves and our chil- 
dren; and 

Whereas, this great calamity has befallen the nation at a time when 
the events of the war and the policy of the President gave promise 
of the speedy restoration of peace and union, and commanded the 
approval of a majority of the patriotic people of the country; there- 
fore 

Mesolved, that in this sad event the nation is called to mourn the 
death of an exalted patriot, and the world a truly honest man ; and 
that the Common Council of the city of Buffalo, feeling that a blow 
has been struck, not only at the national life but at the personal se- 
curity of every citizen of the United States, declare their imalterable 
attachment to the Union and the Constitution, and their determina- 
tion to uphold the National Government and its constituted author- 
ities at whatever cost or peril. 

Mesolved, that tlie city clerk be directed to cause the council cham- 
ber to be suitably draped in black for forty days. 



40 

Mesolved, that a committee of five be appointed to co-operate with 
the committees of tlie Board of Trade and of citizens, in making ar- 
rangements for tlie suitable observance of the funeral obsequies. 

Aid. Bryant moved that James M. Smitli, Esq., be in- 
vited to address tlie Council on tlie subject of tlie above 
report. Carried. 

At a subsequent meeting of the Council, Aid. Marsli, 
by unanimous consent, offered tlie following : 

TTTIIEREAS, arrangements have been perfected by which the re- 
^ * mains of President Lincoln are expected to arrive in this city 
on the morning of the 27th instant, and remain during that day, 
when an opportunity will be afforded our citizens to view the re- 
mains and unite in a testimonial to his memory ; therefore 

Hesolved, that this Council will in a body at such hour, on that 
day, as the committee having the matter in charge shall name, at- 
tend such ceremonies wearing the usual badge of mourning, and 
that his Honor the Mayor be requested to make such arrangements 
on behalf of and at the expense of the city, with reference to the oc- 
casion, as he may think proper. 

Adopted. 



THE FUNERAL OBSEQUIES. 

Wednesday, April 19tli — tlie day set apart for tlie Fu- 
neral Obsequies of President Lincoln — was signalized by 
tbe most solemn ceremonies ever witnessed in Buffalo. In 
accordance witb tlie proclamation of Mayor Fargo and tlie 
request of tlie committees ap2:)ointed to make arrange- 
ments for tlie proper observance of tlie day, business was 
universally suspended, and tlie emblems of mourning were 



41 

visible everywhere. Factory and store, slioj) and oiHce 
were abandoned for the day, and the utmost qniet pre- 
vailed everyr^^here. The day was as balmy as could be 
wished, and long before the time announced for the exer- 
cises. Main street, and other principal streets, were alive 
with moiu'ning humanity. The flags were suspended at 
half-mast, and over the stars and stripes projected the 
emblem of sorrow. Many of the stores on Main street, 
the printing offices, public buildings, depots, and number- 
less dwellings, were heavily draped exteriorly, and but few 
stores or houses in the city were there that did not wear 
the insio-nia of mournino-. The various chm'ches in which 
services were held, the Board of Trade rooms, Common 
Council chamber. Citizens' Club room, and numerous 
other 2)laces, were most tastefully draped interiorly. In 
a number of store windo^vs were displayed the litho- 
gra];)hed likeness of the late President in mourning, and 
on the streets every breast bore its badge, or every left 
arm its crape. As the time for the procession approach- 
ed, the sidewalks on either side of Main street — the win- 
dows of stores from the Terrace to Tup2:>er street — the 
buildings from ground floor to roof, and the streets con- 
verging in Niagara square, became thronged with people 
of all classes and ages, till it seemed as if the poj)ulation 
of the city had turned out en masse. 

At the hour desig^nated, the various divisions which 
were to compose the procession, took position on the 
streets in the vicinity of Niagara square in accordance 



42 

with tlie programme, and througli tlie efforts of tlie police, 
eacli division was allowed ample space for its movements. 

At about ten minutes before twelve, tlie first minute 
gun was fired, tlie bells were rung, and tlie procession 
commenced to move, tlie military companies marching 
with arms reversed. 

The line of march was up Niagara street to Main, up 
Main to Virginia, countermarching on Main to Tu])per, 
down Tupper to Delaware, do^vn Delaware to Niagara, 
up Niagara to Main, do^vn Main to the Terrace, across 
the Terrace to Franklin, up Franklin to Erie, down Erie 
to Terrace street, and thence to the Terrace. 

The procession occupied one hour and five minutes in 
passing a given point, and was about two miles and a half 
in length. Embodying as it did the various military, 
civic, and religious organizations of the city, it was the 
most dignified and imj)Osing funeral cortege ever witness- 
ed in Buffalo. The military bore draped flags, and the 
various societies which followed carried their banners ap- 
propriately decorated. The Fire Department looked bet- 
ter than we ever saw it before, and the decorations of 
their carriages, trucks and engines, were very tasteful. 

The Funeral Car was a superbly draped canopy resting 
on four pillars, richly trimmed with black velvet, silver 
fringed. The car was exquisitely festooned with velvet 
and silver, and the inside of the canopy di'aped in white 
and black crape. In the centre of the car was the dais 
upon which rested the cofiin, the whole covered with 



43 

drapery. The tops of tlie j^illars wliieli supported tlie 
canopy were ornamented with L^rge knots of black and 
white crape, a black plume surmounting the canopy itself. 
The car was decorated hj M. St. Ody, and was altogether 
a magnificent affair. It was drawn by six gray horses, 
each wearing on his head a black plume, and on his back 
a coverino; of l)roadcloth trimmed with frino-e. The ani- 
mals were led by colored grooms, and, with the car to 
which they were attached, made up the most interesting 
feature of the cortege. 

The best of order prevailed, and the movements of the 
procession were made with a precision we have never seen 
equalled. Had a month's discipline been instituted in 
advance, the programme so far as it related to the proces- 
sion, could not have been carried out more satisfactorily ; 
and no less can be said for the lookers-on, who avoided 
the scramble for sight-seeing positions, usual to such occa- 
sions, and preserved the most j^erfect quiet throughout. 

The procession having arrived on the Terrace the various 
divisions were drawn iq^ in lines, the Funeral Car occu- 
pying a position in front of the platform. The stand was 
a laro-e one, erected in front of Pratt & Go's and Pratt &, 
Letchworth's stores, and was very appropriately decorated 
with American flao-s, with whose folds were blended the 
solemn symbols of grief The seats were occupied by the 
orator and officiating clergymen, the 23all-bearers, members 
of the Common Council and Board of Trade, ladies of the 
Sanitary Commission, and others. At half past one 



44 

o'clock, Mr. Lewis F. Allen called the meeting to order, 
and read tlie programme of exercises, after wliicli a dirge 
was played by tlie Union Cornet Band. Tlie following 
eloquent and effective prayer was tlien offered up to the 
Throne of Grace, hj Rev. Dr. Allison : 

OTHOU, who art everywhere present, we acknowledge Thee as 
the Supreme Ruler of the Universe. All things are beneath 
Thy control. All men are subject to Thee. In deep distress we 
approach. Our sorrow and loss are known to Thee. We have 
done evil in Thy sight, O Lord. As a nation we have sinned against 
Thee, and Tliou hast permitted Thy servant, our Chief Magistrate, 
to be taken away from us by the hand of violence. That he lived 
to accomjjlish so much good we adore Thy Holy Name. That he 
was the instrument in Thy hand of siibduing this wicked rebellion, 
and in rescuing so many of onr fellow creatures from slavery, and 
in upholding in its integrity the Constitution of this nation, we 
praise Thee. And now, O our Father, that he is removed, we ])raj 
Thee to bless us and sanctify to oiir good this painful dispensation 
of Thy providence. Where we cannot trace Thee in thy mysterious 
Providences, may we trust Thee. We acknowledge thy sovereign- 
ty and bow down unto Thee. O bless this nation, now bereft of its 
tried and lionored President. Give continued victories to our armies 
and navies until our last enemy is subdued, and no traitor or rebel 
voice be heard throughout our land. Sustain Thy servant, the new- 
ly installed President, in the discharge of the important duties to 
which he is now called. May he have wisdom and strength given 
to him to conduct successfully the aftairs of this great Republic. 
May he receive the confidence and co-operation of the people for 
whose welfare he occupies his high position. May those from whom 
he seeks counsel be under Thy especial direction and care. We 
commend to Thy care our afflicted Secretary of State. We thank 
Thee that Thou hast saved him from sudden death by the assassin's 
knife. Preserve Thou his life, O God, that he may again, by Thy 
blessing, resume his important duties; and may we long enjoy the 
influence of his counsel and wisdom. 

May all who have suffered from this desperate wickedness be 



45 

speedily restored to liealtli again. Look in great compassion npon 
Thine handmaid, who mom'ns in her widowhood to-day. Be Thou 
her stay and support. May her sorrow (keener than ours can be) be 
assuaged by Thee. Protect and guide her children. May the spirit 
of the father be given to the sons. Preserve them that they may 
be a blessing to the land he served so well, and to the people who 
this day mourn his loss. 

Give soundness and health to the sick and wounded soldiers who 
drag out weary days in our hospitals. And we X)ray Thee speedily 
to give peace in all our borders. 

Bless the exercises of this occasion to the good of all present. 
May Thy servant who shall address this great multitude of people, 
be strengthened for the comfortable performance of his duty, and 
may this great concourse of our fellow citizens be protected in safety 
to their homes at the close of these services. May we all be kept 
from danger, accident and sudden death; and, finally, may we in- 
herit eternal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. 

The various singing societies next gave a deep and 
solemn rendering to tlie following lines, ^\Titten for the 
occasion : 

WHAT MEANS THAT CRT? 

What means that cry, that is rising high 
From the darkened land to the startled sky ? 

What means, etc. 
'Tis the solemn sound of a nation's woe, 
For him who was first in its heart, laid low ! 

For him, etc. 

What sudden night, with a spell of might, 
Hath quenched the glow of victory's light ? 

What sudden, etc. 
'Tis a nation's life that is draped iu gloom, 
Its love and its hope that are laid in the tomb. 

What sudden, etc. 

Oh ! let the dirge, with its mournful surge, 
Float o'er the laud to its farthest verge ; 
Oh ! let, etc. 



46 



"While we smooth o'er his honored form the sod, 
And the soul of the martyr ascends to God ! 
And the soul, etc. 



Then followed an extempore oration by tlie Rev. Dr. 
Lord : 

WHY is this vast assembly gathered here to-day ? How comes 
it that the nation is clad in mourning ? Wherrfore are the 
cannon booming, and why is the victorious flag of the Republic 
draped in mourning, and hung at half-mast, from New York to San 
Francisco — from the Bay of Massachusetts to the Chesapeake ? To 
the Chesapeake, did I say? I should have said to the Gulf of 
Mexico. Four years ago a plain man from Illinois declared at 
Washington that this starry flag must be replaced on every South- 
ern town and fortress, and to-day his command is fulfilled. This 
flag waves to-day from Richmond to Raleigh, from Raleigh to 
Columbia, from Columbia to Charleston, from Charleston to Mobile, 
and from Mobile to New Orleans. Whence, then, this mingled 
grief and indignation of which I am to be interpreter, and which 
has a voice and an expression in every town and village of the Re- 
public ? Our venerated President is dead. He has fallen, foully 
slain by the blow of an assassin, and this is the day of his funeral ! 
Twenty millions of people lift their hands to Heaven, crying, 

'■ Remember not our bygone years, 
Great God ! before the mercy seat ; 
Behold a universe in tears, 
A nation at Thy feet ! " 

But whence this terrible agitation ? Why do strong men bow them- 
selves to hide their tears ? Why does the nation stagger under the 
blow like a palsied giant ? and this, too, at the very moment of its 
triumph, when victory after victory is reported to our arms through- 
out the length and breadth of the land ? Why this extraordinary 
grief? Two Presidents, in our past history, have fallen in the 
midst of their labors. Neither is the assassination of rulers and of 
the great and noble a new event in the history of the world. Abraham 



47 

Lincoln is not the first of high officials who have fallen thus. Henry 
IV. of France fell by the dagger of Ravaillac. The Washington of 
Holland, William the Silent, Prince of Orange, was slain by the pis- 
tol shot of an assassin. The great Duke of Buckingham was murdered 
by Felton. In later years a Prime Minister of Great Britain, Mr. 
Percival, was assassinated when passing out of the House of Com- 
mons. How many Kings and other eminent men have barely 
escaped assassination ? Of such are both the first and second 
Napoleon. George HI. of England Avas fired at. In the old Em- 
pire of Russia how large a proportion of its rulers have fallen by 
the dagger ! It is not, therefore, a strange event under the sun 
which calls us together to-day. Whence, then, this immoderate 
grief, — whence this horror in all minds, making the flesh to creep 
with terror ? 

The character and services of our deceased President, together 
with the time and manner of his death, are a sufficient explanation 
of the grief and indignation which has so touched the heart of the 
nation and brought an unnumbered multitude together to-day to 
hear his funeral obsequies. 

Abraham Lincoln was the son of a poor man, and was born of a 
family of poor whites, in Kentucky, in 1809. By the removal of 
the family to a free State, the boy obtained scope for his advance- 
ment. Poverty and ignorance, heirlooms of one of his class in a 
slave State, were no longer necessities of his birth and pecuniary 
condition. He was jDre-eminently a self-made man, and in his 
earlier years followed his fixther's occupation of farming. His first 
promotion was to the captaincy of a militia company raised during 
the Black Hawk war, and he has been known to say that this early 
success gave him more pleasure than any subsequent. It doubtless 
excited his ambition and led him to persevere in his efi:orts at self- 
education. He next became a member of Congress from the State 
of Illinois, and afterwards was a candidate for the United States 
Senatorship, with Stephen A. Douglas [venerahile nomen!) as his 
competitor. Those who have been accustomed to sneer at Abraham 
Lincoln's abilities, should have remembered that the fact of his 
having borne himself with credit against such an antagonist fur- 
nished a most abundant proof of his ability before as well as after 
he became President. Mark well the title of " rail splitter " which 
has been contemjJtuously fastened upou him, and the reproach laid 



48 

upon Andrew Johnson of having risen from a tailor shop. Such 
words are not the going forth of the true liepublican spirit. 

It is the glory of our institutions that the poorest man may look 
forward to his son's becoming the President of the United States, 
and never was a time in our history when the true Democratic 
temper of the American people and the genius of our free institu- 
tions were made more manifest than when a farmer and a tailor 
were elected President and Vice-President of the gi-eat Republic. 
When, if ever, this sneer at labor shall become universal, our 
liberties are lost : our government is a Republic no longer, but an 
Aristocracy almost as bad as that foul oligarchy against which the 
nation, for four years, has been battling for life. The election of 
Abraham Lincoln at the Chicago Convention was a remarkable 
fact. His rival was perhaps the most polished statesman in the 
United States. Mr. Seward is an educated, polished and wealthy 
man, but Providence decreed that the plain man should triumph 
and become President. 

Need I speak of the acts of Abraham Lincoln — how he has 
grown, year by year, upon the resj^ect and affections of the peoj^le ? 
His countenance, homely yet benign ; his j)lain manners, his very 
gait are present with you now, as if you were looking on his face in 
yonder gorgeous hearse. His character was unspotted — not a 
single stain rests upon his memory. He was the most pure, gentle 
and generous of men. He retained his simplicity of character, 
manner and habits in his high position. His blood had not a drop 
of malice in it. He was a peculiar man. There was in him an 
irrepressible vein of humor and an overflowing of anecdote which 
served as a safety valve in his innumerable trials and perjjlexities ; 
with this genial temper he possessed an almost unerring judgment, 
and with all his mildness an imyielding firmness on vital points. 
He carried in his face, and conversation the tokens of a universal 
charity. If his worst enemy had flillen into his power, he would 
have been visited with not a single particle of vengeance. He 
was as ready to forgive his foes as they were eager to injure him. 

Of the religious character of Abraham Lincoln I chance to know 
something more than Avhat appears in his i^ublished words and in 
his recent Inaugural — his Inaugural, that strange prophetic utter- 
ance, more a prayer than a public document, the fervid' jjower of 
which led the London Times to pronounce it Cromwellian. Not 



49 

that tliis haughty, and toward us always contemptuous English 
organ mtended a compliment, but any j)arallel with Cromwell will 
be accepted as such in this country, Avhere the Protector is 
esteemed the ablest man tliat ever ruled over Great Britain. More 
like a prophecy than an address to his fellow-countrymen, tliat 
Inaugural seems to have been inspired by 2)roplietic anticipations 
of the death he has met. I know from the testimony of a member 
of his household that Mr. Lincoln was a man of prayer, a believer 
in the Gosiael. In all the anguish and labor of the first term of 
office he sought God for succor and guidance. "Was ever man so 
traduced, so overborne with trial and sorrow, so i')erplexed, as he 
"who was fain to say, wlien certain persons- visited him and 
reproached liim in regard to the thousands slain at Chancellorsville, 
that he would gladly change his place for that of any of the men 
who lay in their blood on that field ? 

Shall I tell you of" the services of Abraham Lincoln ? lie 
was raised up to guide us through such a trial as no nation 
ever before endured. Not but what the foundations of otlier 
countries have been laid in the blood of civil war. Ours is not 
the first nation which lias been drenched in the gore of its own 
citizens. On the contrary, no nation has ever sent down great 
roots of steadfastness and ^^erpetuity, but these were nourished 
by the blood of civil strife. But what was this trial of ours? 
Eight millions of people revolting, with fury and murder in their 
hearts^-sundering rudely all ties of love, of a common religion, a 
common nationality and a common language ! Never before was 
revolt so formidable : never was its territory so vast, its population 
so numerous, its resources so great, its spirit so revengeful and 
malignant. You are witnesses to-day how patiently and Avith what 
wisdom Abraham Lincoln guided our aflairs until at last the flag of 
the Republic waves over the last fortress of the rebellion and is 
covered with comjilete and final triumph. With the foil of Raleigh, 
of which we hear this morning, the last strongliold of the enemy 
has been surrendered. Wlien Abraham Lincoln entered Richmond 
he was suffered to see, for the first time, the reward of his Avork. 
I will not detain you to speak of the sufferings and trials to which 
he was subject. Assailed on all sides by extreme men ; de- 
nounced by fanatics of opposing schools, and annoyed by the 
divisions and dissensions of his own party, none but a calm, kind, 



50 

wise man such as Abraham Lincoln could have managed to preserve 
harmony among his supporters. How wisely, patiently, urbanely 
and successfully he managed, you are witnesses as you stand to-day 
with tlie rebellion beneath tlie nation's heel, while the venomous 
monster writhes and with its last hiss stings to death our Chief 
Magistrate. 

The time of Abraham Lincoln's death provokes our grief. It seems 
to us that he ought to have seen more of the triumph his hand had 
wrought — that he ought to have lived to see the land fully purged 
of rebellion, and until he felt himself truly to be the undisputed 
President of every inch of soil within the limits of the territory of 
the United States. But God thought otherwise. He caused him 
to go up like Moses, into the mountain at Richmond, and look over 
upon the promised land which it was not permitted him to enter. 
The tnanner of our President's death excites our indignation. Had 
it been wrought at the instigation of personal revenge, or of vin- 
dictiveness which his conduct had created, there would have been a 
different impression made by this stupendous crime. But the assas- 
sin planned his deed at no such impulse. Back of the act stand 
perhaps a thousand conspirators fired by a sentiment of political 
malignity. And the assassin even undertook to play the dramatist, 
appearing after he had committed the foul deed and waving a dag- 
ger, with the words of the motto of Virginia, '•'•Sic semper tyrannis^'' 
in his mouth — " So always with tyrants." He publicly proclaimed 
himself in this theatrical manner the representative of Southern 
secession and treason. The motto might better be translated " So 
always hy tyrants," for it was the tyrant who struck ; it was 
Hampden who fell ! Our horror is provoked because it is an orga- 
nized conspiracy by which we are stricken. The proof of this is 
accumulating from day to day. The assassination of the Pi-esident 
has been publicly advertised, threatened and justified in advance by 
Southern leaders and Southern prints. From the day of his first 
inauguration they have anticipated the crime and made it their aim. 
The rebellion has now executed its first threat in its last venomous 
act — the murder of Abraham Lincoln. The blow is aimed at the 
heart of the country; at you who have stood by your President ; 
at free speech, free soil and free men. 

Besides, Abraham Lincoln is the first ruler of a great nation who 
has been assassinated because he represented liberty. With one 



51 

exception — and that the case of William of Orange, who was killed 
rather as a sacrifice to religious fanaticism than from political mo- 
tives, though his death did gratify the hatred of Philip II. — Presi- 
dent Lincoln is the first instance of a ruler being slain for the sake 
of liberty. Tyrants have fallen often, but never before has the 
head of a government fallen because he was the enemy of slavery 
and tyranny and the friend of freedom. This stirs up our horror — 
this fires our indignation — that a man so just, so merciful, so inno- 
cent, should have fallen to gratify the lust of so foul an oligarchy 
as that of the rebellion. 

But are there no consolations connected Avith this terrible event, 
this tremendous crime ? I have already spoken of his blameless 
life and character and his full preparation for death, and in these 
we find one ground of consolation. But there are others. The 
work of Abraham Lincoln was done. Can we think for a moment 
that God, who preserved him from the pistol of the assassin four 
years, would have suffered him now to have fallen if his Avork had 
not been complete ? Xot if we believe in God. Another consola- 
tion is this : mark it well ! Abraham Lincoln's death by murder 
canonizes his life. His words, his messages, his proclamations, are 
now the American Evangel. The seal of martyrdom is set to Presi- 
dent Lincoln's policy and acts. And may not his death in this way 
accomplish almost as much as his life? God has permitted him to 
die a martyr because He wished to consecrate the works, the polity 
and proclamations of our President as the political Gospel of our 
country, sealed with blood. It will be hard now to oppose anj'thing 
that he has done, or to j^ronounce unwise or foolish aught that he 
has said. 

The assassination of Abraham Lincoln is the crowning proof of 
the barbarizing influence of slavery. There are witnesses here — 
these emaciated and maimed soldiers — who represent the unparal- 
leled sufferings of their class and proclaim the unspeakable barbari- 
ties and atrocities which have made the rebel priscn-pens synony- 
mous with cruelty and murder. The facts are denied in England, 
but they will yet be admitted and made patent before a shuddering 
w^orld. We have seen something of the malevolence of rebellion. 
We have seen fifty thousand of our bravest men starved and tor- 
tured to death in the hands of rebels. Twenty years from now this 
will form the blackest page in history and will be so recognized by 
4 



52 

all civilized men. The English still keep fresh the horror of the 
Black Hole of Calcutta ; but what was the crime of a drunken 
Rajah who could not be waked to give relief to a small corps of 
suffering English prisoners suffocating in an unventilated dungeon, 
compared to the systematic, designed murder by the South of thou- 
sands of their prisoners. These victims of rebellion were starved 
and tortured to death by inches, and atrocities were committed upon 
them which it will not do to name — which even themselves Avill 
never reveal. These things are sufficient proof of the barbarism 
of slavery. For who are the peo23le who committed these crimes ? 
They are of the same stock as ourselves. 

When I resided in Mobile I found that about the half of the 
population were Northern born. How is it that so many men at 
the South of Northern birth and Northern breeding have been 
transformed into demons ? How is it that Massachusetts men as 
editors in Richmond and Charleston exhausted the vocabulary of 
foul and furious epithets in their abuse of the North ? Is there any 
cause for this transformation but slavery ? The South have the same 
language, the same Bible as ourselves — their blood is intermingled 
with ours. It is slavery alone which has debased and brutalized 
them. Its crowning act is the assassination, under the motto of 
Virginia, of President Lincoln. The whole tragedy shows forth 
the virus of insurrection and slavery. And now is there any man 
who, in future, will not curse this monstrous thing ? Will it ever 
be tolerated again, or again find apologists ? 

It may seem hard to say Avhat I am about to affirm of a certain 
class at the South. But I have been there and observed in what 
men the virus of the rebellion is contained. It is not the poor whites, 
nor yet the wealthy slaveholders, but a body of hangers-on upon 
the latter who were wont to fill New Orleans and Mobile with 
corpses night after night, who practise dueling as a j)rofession and 
are without regard for human life, who are responsible for tlie atro- 
cities Avhich have from first to last characterized the great Rebellion. 
This class of the Southern people ought not to live. In the bitter 
words of an old poet they are — 

" As full of devils and as manifold 
As finite vessels of God's wrath can hold ! " 

The death of our venerated President forever silences and shames 



53 

the sympathies of that educated class in Europe who have been ac- 
customed to uphold the South in its rebellion. Those representatives 
of the Confederacy who have been not only tolerated but feted in 
London and Paris, will find a sudden change in their situation when 
the terrible news crosses the ocean. The finger of scorn will be 
pointed at them. I have faith in England and in France as well, 
that the people of each will froni henceforth abhor the cause of which 
this assassination is a representative act, and will brand the sland- 
erers who have filled their newspapers with vile abuse of our gov- 
ernment, as liars and murderers. America is vindicated in the Old 
World by the dead body of its martyred Chief Magistrate. The 
dagger of Booth settled the question of the resjiectability of seces- 
sion in Europe. 

We have another consolation in our confidence in the character 
of Andrew Johnson, the President by succession. God in his Prov- 
idence has called now to the head of the nation a Southern man — 
bred in the midst of slavery — twice a Governor of Tennessee and a 
United States Senator from that State. The judgment of the rebels 
is left to a man whom they have hunted from his home as a par- 
tridge upon the mountains. lie has already announced that he will 
have no mercy for traitors — that he will spare the rank and 
file, but hang the leaders of the rebellion. We are not the advo- 
cates of private or personal vengeance. As individuals, forgiveness 
of all men is our duty. But Andrew Johnson is called as the head 
of the nation to bear the sword of government, and the Apos- 
tle declares that the ruler shall jiot bear the sword in vain. There 
is a solemn curse pronounced on whosoever shall resist the exercise 
of this lawful power. What good citizen will resist this divinely 
appointed authority, or interpose when this sword of justice is lifted 
to punish treason ? Out upon the mawkish sentimentalism which 
would stay this righteous vengeance ! It is neither Christian nor 
manly. God demands that there shall be a vindication of law by 
the sword of lawful authority, and Andrew Johnson will see to it 
that this is done. As I have said elsewhere, the South have put 
aAvay a Son of Consolation and taken in exchange a Son of Thun- 
der. There is a sort of poetical justice in the fact that they are now 
to be judged by a Southern man accredited a statesman by them- 
selves, and constituted their judge by the act of assassination which 
deprives the nation of its venerated President. But, my friends, 



54 

we are all fatigued, and this subject might be elaborated for hours, 
yet the protracted services of this sad occasion demand brevity. 
God has seen fit to repress our joy. 

But a day since we were ready to shout hallelujahs. That exult- 
ation God has seen fit to temper by causing us to look on the broken 
body of our beloved President. The tears of the nation will bedew 
the grave of Abraham Lincoln, and he will be held in all time as the 
first great martyr of American Liberty. The vast army of 300,000 
souls, who in the same cause have suifered before him, will hail the 
advent of their Chief whose life is the most glorious that has been sac- 
rificed in this terrible and hitherto doubtful war. The lowly class 
from whence Abraham Lincoln sprang, will revere his memory and 
rejoice in his glory. Four millions of slaves whom he has freed, will 
forever guard his name and fame with sleepless vigilance and pre- 
sent at his grave their votive offerings, as at a shrine. The nation 
has canonized him, and will sujiplicate for his successor divine sup- 
port and guidance, as they lift to heaven the prayer : " Help, Lord, 
for the godly man ceaseth; for the faithful fail from among the chil- 
dren of men." 

Tliis address of Dr. Lord was necessarily extempore 
from the fact tliat lie liad but a few liours notice of the 
appointment.* 

At the conclusion of the oration Mr. Lewis F. Allen 
addressed a few words to the audience, detailing an inter- 
view he had had a short time since with the late Presi- 
dent at Washington. On Mr. Allen's informing him that 
the people of the North were all Avell pleased with his 
course, Mr. Lincoln replied that he was glad to hear it, 
adding : "I have done just as well as I knew how." 



* [ The editor is requested by Dr. L. to express his appreciation of the ability and 
fidelity of the reporter, David Gray, Esq., of the Courier.'] 



00 



At the close of Mr. Allen's remarks, tlie sin£>:m2: socie- 
ties sano; tlie followins; : 

REST, SPIRIT, REST. 

Rest, (rest,) rest, (resl.) rest, spirit, rest, (rest.) 
In Heaven blest, Rest, spirit, rest, (rest.) 

Rest, spirit, rest, 
Thou art tied, to realms of endless day. 
In Heaven blest, by warbling choirs of seraphs led 
Soar, spirit, soar away, Rest, spirit, rest. 

Rest, (rest,) rest, (rest.) rest, spirit, rest, (rest.) 
In Heaven blest. Rest, rest, spirit, rest, (rest.) 
Soar, spirit, soar, (spirit soar,) spirit soar, (spirit soar.) 
In Heaven blest, (heaven blest,) spirit rest, (spirit soar.) 

Rest, (spirit,) rest, spirit rest, (spirit rest.) 
In Heaven blest, (rest,) rest, (rest,) rest, spirit rest. 

Benediction by the Rev. Dr. Smitli closed tlie impres- 
sive exercises, and the immense assemblage congregated 
on the Terrace dispersed. Pleasant and exhilarating as 
the day was, there was no disposition anywhere manifest- 
ed to give it a holiday character, as is generally the case 
when an entire community are relieved from all business 
care and duty. Seriousness and sorrow held the suj^rem- 
acy in every heart, for the people, mth one accord, 
mourned sincerely the loss of their Chief, and clasjijcd 
hands in a common grief To see men of all j^arties, and 
religious denominations ; of opposing classes and interests ; 
of antagonistic thought and action, stand upon a single 
platform, and do homage as one man to the memory of 
the great martyr, could not but waken the strongest emo- 
tions of thankfulness, that the destinies of this great na- 
tion are in the keeping of such a people. Wednesday, 



56 

April lOtli, will never be forgotten by those wlio took 
part directly or indirectly in the obsequies of President 
Lincoln. 

Tlie committee wlio perfected the arrangements for the 
observance of the day, and Chief Marshal Major-General 
Howard and his Aids, are all entitled to the gratitude of 
the city for the manner in which the ceremonies were con- 
ducted. So far as the procession is .concerned, it is uni- 
versally admitted that it was the grandest ever witnessed 
in Buffalo, and the march was worthy of veterans. 



THE REMAINS OF THE PEE SILENT AT BATA VIA — THE IB 
AEBIVAL AND RECEPTION AT BUFFALO. 

From the Buffalo Commercial Advertiser of April 27th and 28th. 

npHE committee appointed to proceed to Batavia, to meet the fu- 
-*- neval train, left at 6 o'clock on the evening of the 20th, a special 
car having been provided for their accommodation. They were 
hospitably received and courteously entertained by the citizens of 
that place. The follovi^ing gentlemen composed the committee : 

Hon. Millard Fillmore, Hon. James SHELDOisr, 

" N. K. Hopkins, " E. S. Peossor, 

" I. A. VeRPLANCK, " P. DORSHEIMER, 

" J. G. Hasten, John Wilkeson, 

" F. P. Stevens, S. H. Fish, 

" Henry Martin, S. S. Jewett. 

THE RECEPTION AT BATAVIA. 

The people of the village were aAvakened by the firing of cannon 
before daylight this morning, and as the gray dawn appeared a most 
imposing sight was witnessed at the depot. It seemed to us that 
the entire population of the village, men and women, young and 



57 

old, liad assembled about the spot. The two sides of the depot 
were tastefully and appropriately draped — the work of the town 
authorities, under the superintendence of Homer Bostwick, Esq., 
President of the village. Many of the most prominent places in the 
village were also draped in mourning. 

Promptly to a moment, according to a special time-table pre- 
viously arranged, the pilot engine, Avith one car attaclied, made its 
api)earance. These were simply but becomingly draped. 

After the lapse of ten minutes the funeral train made its appear- 
ance. This was composed of nine cars — three sleeping cars — be- 
sides the funeral car, in which lay the remains of the lamented dead. 
The coaches furnished by the company were all new, and probably 
formed the most elegant train which ever passed over the road. All 
were tastefully draped. 

THE FUNERAL CAB. 

The funeral car is a beautiful specimen of the builder's art, and 
was designed and constructed by Mr, B. P. Lamerson, for Mr. Lin- 
coln's use, but the present sad occasion is the first time this splen- 
did car has been put in motion. Of a deep chocolate color, the 
panels relieved with a delicate tracery of small pure Avhite lines, the 
car would seem almost specially designed for its present use. There 
are twelve windows with plate glass panes on each side, and the 
entire exterior of the car is of the richest character. 

The edge of the roof is tastefully and richly hung with deep silver 
fringe, as well as the ends of the porches. Above the windows is 
a heavy row of crape festoons, looped over each window by a silver 
star and a large silver button tassel. Pendant between each win- 
dow hangs a deep fold of crape, edged with silver fringe. 

Tlie interior of the car is hung with black tapestry, which com- 
pletely conceals the rich walnut paneling, and the closets, sleeping 
berths and other appliances of comfort. The platform upon which 
the coffin stands is covered with black, and all around the car the 
deep and solemn aspect of the interior is somewhat brightened and 
relieved by silver stars and tassels. 

THE TRAIN. 
As the train approached the depot, all heads were uncovered, 
and the deepest silence prevailed. The locomotive was the ."• Dean 



58 

Richmond," a splendidly built machine, one of the largest and most 
powerful on the road. In the front, over the lamp, two American 
flags, intertwined with emblems of mourning, were gracefully fes- 
tooned, while beneath the lamp was a fine j^ortrait of the deceased 
President, also en wreathed in black. In the sockets for the flag- 
staiF on either side, was a beautiful bouquet composed of evergreens, 
lillies of the valley, ivy, etc. A similar boiaquet also surmounted 
the sand box. The hand rails were gracefully festooned with 
white and black crape, and the polished work shone with dazzling 
brightness. 

The delegates from Bufialo took their places in the car reserved 
for them, as did also the delegation from Batavia, composed of the 
following gentlemen : 

Harry Wilber, H. J. Glowacki, 

D. W. ToMLiNsox, Bejtj. Peingle, 

Jerry Haskell, W. S. Mallory, 

Myrox H. Peck, Wm. Tyrrell, 

John Fisher, D. D. Waite, 

Seth Wackerman, H. U. Howard. 
L, Doty, 

A most i^leasing feature in the reception at Batavia, was the sing- 
ing of a choir, under the lead of Myron H. Peck, Esq. On a plat- 
form, which had been erected for the purpose immediately in front 
of the depot, a large number of ladies and gentlemen took their po- 
sition, and the sweet strains of the hymn "Speed Away," floated 
out on the morning air, producing a most solemn and beautiful 
eifect. Another hymn followed, and the train took its departure. 

The citizens of Batavia — ladies and gentlemen — are entitled to 
all praise for the good taste and feeling displayed. 

The various stations on the road were passed at the precise time 
set down ; and at each place, and for that matter, all along the en- 
tire route, the inhabitants, notwithstanding the early hour, thronged 
the way, and silently and respectfully uncovered as the train passed. 

THE ARRIVAL AT BUFFALO. 

How shall we attempt to describe the scene on approaching the 

city ? It seemed to us as we stood upon the platform of the car and 

looked over the vast multitudes which thronged every street and 

sidewalk, every window and house-top, every available position, in 



59 

fact, that the popuLation of Buifalo must have been trebled since yes- 
terday, and that all had flocked to that portion of the city through 
which the train passed on its way to the depot. 

Arrived in the depot, the officers in charge, the escort, commit- 
tees and otliers were shown into Bloomer's model railroad dining 
saloon, where a sumptuous and very acceptable breakfast had been 
prepared. 

Breakfast over, and the hour of eight o'clock having arrived, the 
remains were taken from the funeral car and conveyed to the hearse 
prepared to receive them — that used on the 19th. 

LEAVING THE DEPOT. 
The coffin was borne on tlie shoulders of ten of the soldiers, pre- 
ceded by Gen. Dix and Staif, the officers composing the cortege, 
and the members of Gov. Fenton's Stafl:', viz: 

Insjyector General — Geo. E. Batchellok. 
Judge Advocate General — A. W. Harvey. 
Quartermaster General — Mekritt. 
Paymaster General — Marvi:x. 
Chief Military Bureau — Col. L. L. Dott. 

The sergeants bearing the coffin were flanked by the remainder 
of the Guard of Honor with drawn swords. On the right and left 
of these walked the bearers, as follows : 

Samuel F. Pratt, Geo. R. Babcock, 

Warrex Bryant, Wji. Wilkeson, 

G. T. Williams, Jacob Heimlich, Jr., 

Tugs. J. Dudley, Isaac Holloway. 

The coffin being placed on the hearse, and all being in readiness, 
the procession commenced its march. 

THE PROCESSION. 
The following was the order of the procession : 

Major-General R. L. PIoward and Stafl". 

Union Cornet Band. 

Brigadier-General Wm. F. Rogers and Staff. 

Vith Regt. N. G., Col. W. G. Seely. 

Battery of Light Artillery — 6 pieces — commanded by 

Lieut.-Colonel R. Flach. 

Miller's Band. 



60 



^ , Army and Xavy Officers. 

Major-General Dix and other General Officers in carriages. 



6 



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3 td 



Civic Escort. 

Citizens' Committee on foot. 

Common Council on foot. 

Citizens in Carriages. 

Citizens on foot. 

AROUND ST. JAMES BUILDINGS. 
The crowd in the neighborhood of the St. James Buildings was 
immense, and it was with the utmost difficulty that the police, who 
seemed to be everywhere present, were enabled to carry out their 
instructions and enforce obedience to the regulations which were 
made for the accommodation of all. Xo cars or other vehicles were 
allowed to i:)ass along Main or Eagle streets — ropes being stretched 
across the former, and the latter having been closed by a high board 
fence. 

IN THE HALL. 

After traversing the route laid down, tlie funeral car stopped in 
front of the Main street entrance of the Hall, about 9 o'clock, and 
the coffin was borne by its trusty guardians to the place prepared 
for it. The lid was removed from the face by the embalmer and the 
undertaker, who accompanied the train from Washington, and the 
face of the martyred President was exposed to view. Wreaths of 
flowers were placed itpon the coffin and a most beautiful flora^l de- 
vice in the shape of a har]), with broken strings, the gift of the ladies 
of the St. Cecilia Society, was placed at the head. 



61 

About 10 o'clock, the doors were thrown open and the public 
were admitted to the Hall. 

The internal arrangements of the Hall for exhibiting the remains 
of the President could not, in our opinion, have been better con- 
ceived, when it is remembered that in the construction of public 
halls for exhibitions but little provision is or can be made for exhib- 
iting except with gas light. In draping with black such a hall as 
the St. James, the light of the few windows is so much absorbed or 
shut out that we think the plan adopted of depending entirely upon 
gas for lighting was an admirable one. The tent or canopy was 
erected in the centre of the Hall, fifty feet in diameter by thirty in 
extreme height. Two thousand yards of black undressed cambric 
were used in its construction. It was lighted by the large chande- 
lier, the fifty jets of which, tempered by the sombre surroundings 
created a pleasing yet saddening eflect upon the mind, entirely in 
keeping with the time and occasion. 

The walls of the canopy were decorated with hangings of black 
velvet and silver bullion fringe, alternating with large braids of 
black and silver, with large rosettes interspersed. Ten large mourn- 
ing pillars, appropriately festooned, were distributed around the 
sides of the canopy. 

Tlie platform or dais upon which the coffin rested, was beautiful 
in design and in decoration, so perfectly in keejiing with the finish 
of the coffin that it seemed that one mind must have conceived both. 
To M. St. Ody belongs the credit of all this, and if any evidence had 
previously been required to establish his reputation as a gentleman 
of exquisite taste, the deficiency has been abundantly supplied. 

The entrance from Main street was reserved for ladies. On enter- 
ing here all passed up the right liand side of the stairway, entered the 
main Hall through the side door, passed the coffin over a raised and 
railed platform, and countermarching, passed out by the same door 
and stairs through which they entered — always keeping to tlie right, 
and thus avoiding confusion. Gentlemen entered by the Eagle street 
door, passed vip the easterly stairs, thence through the Hall, past the 
coffin, and down by the westerly stairs. ISTo person was allowed to 
stop or leave the line for a moment. The order was excellent. Since 
the doors were first opened for the reception of visitors this morn- 
ing, there has not been a single moment's pause in the living stream 
which has flown through the Hall. Twenty thousand we believe 



62 

would not be too high an estimate of the number which visited it 
between nine o'clock and noon. 

Before the opening of the coffin, a dirge was sung by the members 
of the St. Cecilia Society, occupying a position in the gallery, above 
the canopy which enclosed the coffin, and the effect was pronounced 
by those who were j^resent, as striking and impressive in the ex- 
treme. The coffin having been o^jened, the singers changed their 
position to the oi:)posite side of the Hall, and again the solemn 
strains of the dirge filled the vast apartment. 

VISIT OF THE COMMON COUNCIL. 
At 12 o'clock the Common Council of the city of Buffalo and the 
city officials, headed by Mayor Fargo, the Supervisors of Erie 
county, the Common Council of the city of Rochester, with Mayor 
Moore and Aid. Draper, President of the Council, Brig.-Gen. Wil- 
liams, of the 25th N. G., and staff, and Col. Clark, of the 54th N. G., 
and staff, visited the Hall. The civil and military officers from 
Rochester arrived on the eight o'clock train, and joined our city of- 
ficials at the Council Chamber by invitation. 

Throughout the entire day some of the officers belonging to the 
escort, accompanied by officers of the Union Continentals, main- 
tained a position at the head of the coffin, and never was there a 
single moment when some of them were not immediately beside the 
remains. 

It is impossible to speak too highly in praise of the members of 
the Police force who were on duty inside the Hall. Vigilant and 
untiring, they performed their duties in a manner thoroughly ac- 
ceptable to all. Never speaking above a whisper, passing noiseless- 
ly through the Hall, they were everywhere present, courteous but 
firm, neat and gentlemanly in appearance, and were materially in- 
strumental in bringing about the results so highly spoken of. 

The Union Continentals, too, are deserving of all praise. From 
morning till night they Avere at their j)osts, performing their oner- 
ous duties with a degree of efficiency, and a cheerfulness and alac- 
rity, hardly to be expected in men whose age and position entitle 
them to rank among the fathers of the city. 

Having conversed with several observing gentlemen whose duty 
required them to be j^resent in the Hall throughout the day — some 



63 

of them having counted and " timed " tlie number passing the coffin 
at various intervals — we are convinced that at least one hukdred 
THOUSAND persons visited the Hall from the opening to the close. 

The stores on Main street, and, indeed, throughout the greater 
portion of the city, were closed during the day. Many of the prom- 
inent places of business on Main street were elaborately and beauti- 
fully draped in white and black, and there was no place Avhich did 
not exhibit some signs of mourning. Flags at half mast, shrouded 
and drai)ed, Avere seen on every hand, and every possible mark of 
respect was apparent. 

CLOSING THE COFFIN. 

At ten minutes past eight o'clock, Capt. N". K. Hall, of the Union 
Continentals, gave the order for the doors to be closed, and all fur- 
ther admission was denied. The Continentals formed in single file, 
and passed around the coffin to take a last look at the fice of the 
illustrious dead; the embalmer and his assistant removed the wreaths 
of flowers from the coffin and silently britshed the dust from the vel- 
vet covering ; the lid was screwed down and the flowers replaced ; 
the manly looking Sergeants of the Guard of Honor — the carriers 
— approached and reverently raised the coffin to their shoulders 
and proceeded with it out of the Hall — past their comrades and 
officers drawn up with sabres at the present — j^ast the Continent- 
als in the outer Hall — past the soldiers of the '74th — past the Com- 
mittees — and bore it to the funeral car which was in waiting in 
front of the Main street entrance. 

DEPABTUIiE OF THE TBAIN. 

The escort was the same as in the morning. The depot was 
reached — the body was borne to the funeral cai", and the escort 
took its leave. A large gathering of citizens surrounded the depot 
and crowded the entrances. 

The train on the Lake Shore road consisted of nine coaches, in- 
cluding the funeral car and the magnificent sleeping car which liad 
also come from Washington. The coaches of the Lake Shore road 
were new and beautiful, and all were decorated with exquisite taste. 

The hour of departure having arrived, the train moA'cd oW 
promptly at the minute, the solemn strains of the dirge, performed 
by Miller's Band, filled the place, and the remains of the venerated 



64 

Chief Magistrate of the Union passed on their way to their final 
resting-place. 

The citizens of Buffalo acquitted themselves with high honor 
on this sorrowful occasion, and the part taken by them on the mem- 
orable 27th of April, 1865, will be recorded and mentioned to their 
credit for a century to come. 

The '74th Regiment never looked better than yesterday, and Col. 
Seely, Lieut.-Col. Baker and all the otficers and men may congratu- 
late themselves upon the fact that their bearing was such as to call 
forth not only the praise of our citizens, but that of veteran ofiicers 
fresh from the field, whose opinions in such matters are entitled to 
additional weight. 



NOTE. 

The Editor of this pamphlet desires to say that the greater part of 
the matter has been selected from the reports of the different daily 
papers of the city. His object has been simply to present a cor- 
rected history of the proceedings had in Buffalo, commemorative of 
the death of President Lincoln, in a shape better adapted for preser- 
vation than in those " brief chroniclers of the times" to whom he is 
thus indebted. 

It is pro^jer to add that, besides those here given, several sermons 
were preached on the occasion. Some of these have been published 
in pamphlet form, which will account for their absence from this ; 
others he would have been glad to give, but they were either not 
accessible to him, or w^ould not come within the limit prescribed 
for the work. 



-f. 



From the Buffalo Commercial Advertiser, May M, 1865. ' 

THE SILENT SORROW OF THE ENFRANCHISED SLAVE. 

Suggested by the Obsequies of Frcsident Lincoln in Buffalo. 
BT JOHN C. LORD. 

- The silent sorrow of the eufranchised slave 
Has no fit place amid our sad array ; 
No symbol of these mourning millions wave 
Among our emblems, as they should, to-day. 

What tears like theirs, for whom the Martyr bled? 

What wail of thronging thousands can compare 
With their unspoken anguish for the dead, 

Deep in its silence, dumb in its despair? 

No booming cannon vocalize their grief, 

No long j)rocessions, moving sad and slow; 
No solemn dirges give their souls relief, 

No gorgeous standards, draped with signs of woe. 

Sadly the Freedmen wend from hill and vale, 

Gath'ring in their rude huts at set of sun, 
In solemn awe, to hear the appalling tale 

Of that foul deed on their Deliverer done. 

Ah ! who can know their untold agony, 

To whom his death appears the crowning loss ? — 

So the Disciples feared on that dread day 
AVhen the great Sufferer hung upon the Cross. 

The sable Mother, as her eyes grow dim. 

Wails o'er her first-born by the cottage fi^re; 
Freedom, though late for her is all to him — 

Must it, alas! with that great life expire? 

Old, scarred and palsied slaves, who from the shore 

Of burning Afric in their youth were torn, 
Bow down in speechless misery before 

The tale of horror on the breezes borne ! 

They know not that the manner of his death 
Forever seals their chartered rights as men — 

That in their Martyr's last expiring breath 
-The Nation heard these solemn words again : — 

Two hundred years of unrequited toil 

Save heaped up treasure for this day of blood, 
And every drop of Slave-gore on our soil 

Demands another from the Sword of God ! 



S '12 



